Making Fashion Accessible for People with Vision Impairments Michele A. Burton, Jennifer Beser, Callie Neylan, Amy Hurst University of Maryland, Baltimore County 1000 Hilltop Circle Baltimore, MD 21250 {mburton1, jbeser1, neylan, amyhurst}@umbc.edu ABSTRACT Clothing and fashion are significant forms of communication and are ubiquitous to every lifestyle in every culture, yet fashion is a visual language. Thus, those with vision impairments have a distinct disadvantage because they cannot see what constitutes the norms and extremes of the fashion nuances on others but most everyone they encounter can see (and judge) their fashion choices. In an initial qualitative study with eight vision-impaired women we discovered two distinct clothing-related information needs: objective (e.g., color and washing instructions) and subjective (e.g., whether a garment is appropriate for an occasion). Based on this initial diary study and a follow-up online survey, we are exploring pervasive technology solutions that translate this visual medium into one that is more accessible. The first is a wearable technology for tagging clothes with the objective information. The second is a social collaboration project connecting sighted people with those with vision impairments to gather opinions and advice on the subjective information. Through these projects we hope to remove some of the accessibility barriers that clothing currently presents for many with vision impairments. Categories and Subject Descriptors H5.m. Information interfaces and presentation (e.g., HCI): Miscellaneous. General Terms Design, Human Factors Keywords Fashion, Blind, Vision Impairments, Assistive Technology, Wearable Technology 1. INTRODUCTION From the book fashion as communication by Malcolm Barnard, he summarizes “…fashion, clothing and dress [are] said to be cultural phenomena insofar as they [are] signifying practices. They [are], that is, some of the ways in which a social order [is] experienced and communicated” [2]. Other books such as Fashion, Culture, and Identity explore the “visual language” of personal adornment [5]. These books confirm what is already widely accepted as a general truth as seen through clichés such as “the clothes make the man” (a saying in the United States). Although there are many factors that determine if someone purchases an article of clothing, appearance is a major, if not dominant, factor. And in order to know what someone is wearing, generally a person does not walk up to a stranger and touch their body; they simply look at the person. This reliance on vision results in fashion being difficult to translate to someone with a visual impairment. For example, one finds sentiments such as “Then your child ought to be learning that stripes and plaids-- whatever those are--don't go together…” [11]. Because fashion is intensely visual it is also greatly inaccessible for people with vision impairments. Through two research studies we identified accessibility barriers and areas where people would like more assistance with their clothing decisions. From this we identified two key projects to address these accessibility challenges and explore accessible fashion. 2. RESEARCH FINDINGS 2.1 Diary Study Our initial research study consisted of one-hour in-person interviews and a 10-day diary study with eight female participants (ages 21 to 73, average 37.25) with varying vision impairments including low vision, loss of vision at birth, and loss of vision later in life. Our study was open to men and women but only women responded to the invitation. This work focused on understanding what makes clothing aesthetically appealing given it is primarily a visual medium, so we left the interviews and diary study instructions open-ended to ensure we gathered as much relevant data as possible. Our findings included the following: Touch is the most dominant sense used to evaluate clothing. Having tactile features on clothes adds to the appeal since touch takes the place of visually interesting aspects. However, touch can also be deceptive as clothes that feel “harsh” (such as stiff or rough fabrics) are deemed “ugly” but may actually be visually appealing to those who are sighted. Having one’s own since of “style” is often not possible because someone sighted confirms almost all clothing choices. Thus, the influence of that person’s opinion is always prevalent in clothing decisions. While shopping, it is not uncommon to ask for sighted person’s assistance or advice. Shopping online may not require assistance if the descriptions are detailed and the site is trusted. But shopping in a store always requires assistance in navigating the store and finding articles to try on. Doing this independently would take too much time and still leave one without certain vital information such as color, size, and price. Ultimately there is a desire to “fit in” with the crowd, especially since devices such as white canes and guide dogs cause a person to stand out (often in an undesirable way). But one cannot see what others are wearing to know what it means to “fit in”. There are no readily available assistive technologies to assist with clothing decisions aside from color identifiers, which are not reliable. This often leads to limiting one’s wardrobe such as excluding certain fabrics because the washing instructions on the clothing tag are not accessible or eliminating certain accessories because it would add one more thing to memorize when coordinating an outfit.