Universal Design in Asia
Last weekend in Hong Kong, I spotted this sign in a taxi. The taxi number is provided both in braille as well as English as raised characters. Nice to see public transport people paying attention to accessibility.
We were talking about this when my brother mentioned Japanese beer cans having braille markings.
Japanese alcoholic drinks also carry an “alcohol” braille character on top to prevent visually disabled people from accidentally consuming it.
A depression on the milk carton (left) to distinguish it from other drinks.
Universal design is not just for visually disabled people. Here you see a shampoo and a conditioner bottle from Japan. The bottle on the left contains shampoo and it has markings on one of its sides to distinguish it from the conditioner.
October 27th, 2006 at 6:03 pm
I never realised this before, thats awesome that there are packaging is visually-challenged friendly.
October 29th, 2006 at 1:08 pm
Accessible design in Asia…
Preetam shows us the design of everyday things in Asia can incorporate accessibility…….
November 2nd, 2006 at 12:28 pm
Well I didn’t realize it until one day I had use the shampoo and I could only tell them apart because my friend had mentioned it to me.
November 25th, 2006 at 11:06 am
[...] Spotted this post from Preetam, who came across what he wrote as “Universal Designs”. I’ve not seen Braille on Beer Cans — I thought it was a neat idea, when Preetam pointed out that it’s both to inform those Braille-readers who want to drink beer, as well as those who want to avoid accidentally consuming it. I titled the post “Accessible Design” rather than “Universal Design”, as I felt the term “Universal” was too broad. I’m not sure if any design can truly be “universally”, i.e. accessible by all. But I’m happy to be proven wrong! [...]