Description: Design permeates every dimension of our lifeworld, from the products we consume and the built environments in which we live to the adorned and stylized beings that we are and the natural preserves where we seek relief from the stressful bustle of urban life. Design is where contrasting values of functionality and aesthetic pleasure converge. At the core of design is the human soma, an active, perceptive subjectivity that creates and evaluates design but is also its cultivated product. This collection of ten essays explores the somaesthetics of design in multiple fields: from ritual, craft, and healthcare to architecture, urbanism, and the new media of extended realities.
Review Quotes: "I hope that Somaesthetics and Design Culture will introduce new ways of thinking and doing to designers and educators via its pragmatist approach; and somaesthetics will continue to create its own community to heal the world via transformative experiences." - Erdem Üngür, in: The Design Journal, 2024
"What makes the somaesthetic approach unique is that it implies 'a project of appreciating and cultivating the body not only as an object that externally displays beauty, sublimity, grace, and other aesthetic qualities, but also as a subjectivity that perceives these qualities and that experiences attendant aesthetic pleasures somatically'. [...] Shusterman and Veres (do) focus on a previously ignored range of meanings of design, which complements the capitalist counterpart: 'design as something sensual, pleasing, emotionally significant, and engaging.' - Ármin Tillmann, in: Disegno, Journal of Design Culture, VIII, no.2, 2026
"This volume aims to initiate an interdisciplinary platform, bringing together different perspectives for analysis, critique, and inspiration. [...] To conclude, more than directly appropriable guidelines, what is offered here is an invitation to take on somaesthetics as a bridge and connect design research with other disciplines through a holistic lens." - Estelle Berger, in: Somaesthetics and Design Culture, 2025