Arts Thread

How can design help those who can't smell navigate an odorless reality? Anora is a cross-modal toolkit comprising a mobile app paired with a family of beautiful lighting fixtures for the home that sense dangerous gasses for you if you don’t have the ability to smell known as anosmia. Anora talks to you via audio-visual signals that are drawn from existing sensory associations such as taste-color and odor-color to unite a smelling experience to the anosmic one. The use of odorants as a safety measure in gas leaks is a prominent example of not only the role of scent in life-threatening situations but also, the exclusion of anosmics from its design. Made for an odorless reality, Anora aims to resolve smell related dangers and spread awareness about a relatively unknown and consequently misunderstood sensory impairment. The interlinked system draws safety limits from gas sensor data, translates it into audio-visual cues, and may be customized for each room to provide a sense of safety, social inclusion, and better quality of life. Anora proposes methods on designing products that enhance sensory awareness instead of eliminating them, and to visualize the invisible in a thought provoking and conversation sparking form.