Landscape architect, accessibility expert to showcase work at Penn State

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Alexa Vaughn, a Deaf landscape architect and accessibility specialist at MIG Inc. whose work focuses on inclusive design for and with the disabled community, will deliver a Department of Landscape Architecture Bracken Lecture titled “Design with Disabled People Now: Including the Deaf and Disabled Communities in the Design Process” at 6 p.m. on March 30 in the Jury Space of the Stuckeman Family Building on Penn State's University Park campus.

As part of the Stuckeman School’s Lecture and Exhibit Series, the talk will be livestreamed via WPSU and coincides with the opening of an exhibition featuring Vaughn’s work in the adjacent Rouse Gallery.

Vaughn’s goal through her work is to create a more inclusive design process and a more accessible public realm that centers on the Deaf and disabled communities. She has expertise in designing for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing (HoH) community and facilitating disabled community engagement during the design process.

As a 2020 Landscape Architecture Foundation (LAF) Olmsted Fellow, Vaughn focused her efforts on shifting the commonly held design approach from one that simply complies with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) — and the accompanying ADA Standards for Accessible Design — to one that regards the standards as a bare minimum while expanding the possibilities of inclusive design for some largely overlooked disabled groups, such as members of the HoH, autistic and neurodivergent communities.

In 2018, Vaughn authored “DeafScape,” a series of design concepts that apply Gallaudet University’s DeafSpace concepts to the public landscape, specifically focusing on accommodating Deaf and HoH individuals. The work was featured widely in publications such as “ArchDaily,” “Curbed” and “Elle Décor.”

She has been published in the American Society of Landscape Architects’ (ASLA) "The Dirt" and LAF's “Landscape Performance Series.” She also advised the ASLA Universal Design Guide, which was published online in August 2019.

Vaughn earned both her bachelor’s and master’s of landscape architecture degrees from the University of California, Berkeley.

Learn more about Vaughn’s work via designwithdisabledpeoplenow.com.