ADA at 35: Navigating Accessibility in the Hybrid Interior

Have advances in technology and the user experience made us more or less connected? Technology has enabled people of all abilities to connect and engage virtually for intentional interactions on multiple platforms. But can online and onsite users meet equitably in the hybrid world for less structured contact? How does this help or hinder accessibility? Is it possible to read visual, spatial, and emotional cues when body language is not evident?

This discussion and demonstration will explore the infrastructure of a successful hybrid interior, including physical and virtual components such as acoustics, furniture shapes, sound and video equipment. It will address access for multiple types of disabilities within one hybrid space, translation technologies, virtual reality meeting rooms and augmented reality interiors, as well as future implications of Immersive Interiors—the fusion of digital, virtual, and physical interior spaces.

Speakers:
Jacob (Jake) deHahn, CPACC, Regional Inclusion Design Specialist, ADAPT Co-Lead & Presentation Specialist, Gensler
Mara Mills, Associate Professor and Ph.D. Director of Media, Culture, and Communication, New York University; Co-founding Director, NYU Center for Disability Studies
David Serlin, Professor of Communication, UC San Diego
Emily Lim Rogers, Assistant Professor of Cultural Anthropology, Duke University

Moderator:
Barbara Laskey Weinreich, Assoc. AIA, RA, NCIDQ, Assistant Professor of Interior Design, FIT/SUNY

About the Speakers:

A proud queer, deaf, and neurodivergent creative, Jacob (Jake) deHahn, CPACC (Certified Professional in Accessible Core Competencies), nimbly floats between inclusive design, marketing, branding, strategy, and digital experience design. He’s a Southeast Regional Inclusive Design Champion and a fierce advocate for disability rights, highlighted by being a co-creator and leader of ADAPT, Gensler’s firmwide affinity group for disabled and neurodivergent staff. DeHahn brings humor, storytelling, and lived experiences to any conversation surrounding how meetings, events, and experiences can be more inclusive for all. He’s helped clients like Nike and Microsoft, as well as Gensler’s internal change management projects, thoughtfully address inclusion, neurodiversity, and digital accessibility.

Mara Mills is Associate Professor and Ph.D. Director of Media, Culture, and Communication at New York University and co-founding Director of the NYU Center for Disability Studies, a hub for public humanities and disability arts programming. She is also a founding editorial board member of the journal Catalyst: Feminism, Theory, Technoscience. She is recently coeditor of the collections How to be Disabled in a Pandemic (NYU Press, 2025), funded by the National Science Foundation; Crip Authorship: Disability as Method (NYU Press, 2023), a CHOICE Reviews Outstanding Academic Title; and a special issue of the journal Osiris on "Disability and the History of Science" (University of Chicago Press, 2024). She is currently working on a collaborative research project with anthropologist Michele Friedner, (formerly) funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, on "The Global Cochlear Implant.

David Serlin is Professor of Communication at UC San Diego, where he teaches courses on historical and cultural approaches to architecture, disability, and sensory design. His most recent book is Window Shopping with Helen Keller: Architecture and Disability in Modern Culture (University of Chicago Press, 2025). He is a Fellow of the American Academy in Rome, which awarded him the 2021 Rome Prize in Architecture.

Emily Lim Rogers is a medical anthropologist whose work focuses on chronically ill and disabled communities and the ways they navigate bureaucratic systems through activism. Her book, Sick Work: Exhaustion, Labor, and Invisible Illness is forthcoming from Duke University Press. Recent publications include pieces in the recent anthologies Crip Authorship: Disability as Method (NYU Press, 2024) and How to Be Disabled in a Pandemic (NYU Press, 2025).
 
Barbara Laskey Weinreich is an assistant professor of interior design at FIT/SUNY. Barbara has taught at Pratt Institute, the NJ Institute of Technology, and The New York School of Interior Design where she most recently was the Director of Graduate Programs. She was also founding Principal at MNA (now Neumann & Rudy), a leader in retail design.