This thesis describes the graduation project of Imara Stemvers. Within the project, an interactive art installation was developed that lets visitors explore their sexuality.

There is an absence of queer perspectives in Design for Sexuality (DfS). To enable the reintroduction of these perspectives, their representation must be facilitated through enabling the queer community to actively participate in visualising their experiences. The selected design form for this is an installation.
Queer theory was analysed to constitute an overview of queer concepts, which was validated through conducting an interview research that gathered empirical lived experiences of these queer concepts. Through Reflexive Thematic Analysis, five themes emerged. This enabled determining the main message of the installation: sexuality is fluid, not linked to binaries, and open to change over time.

Three design directions were drafted that might represent the concept in an installation, through expert interviews and auto-ethnographic research. One concept was chosen: an installation as a reflective space, in which visitors can reflect on queer concepts personally and are invited to actively participate with them. The target group was shifted from queer persons to non-queer persons, in order to give the design intention a larger potential reach.

From Foucault’s theory on queer spatial design, a list of requirements was drawn. These requirements served as inspiration to ideate and prototype from, and a final design concept was created. This concept was constructed and exhibited in the main hall of the faculty of Industrial Design Engineering of the TU Delft.

Through evaluating the concept in action, it can be concluded that the installation enables representation of queer experiences in the domain of sexuality. The queer experience within sexuality was found to go beyond the sexual. To assure a more complete representation, the installation must be developed into this future direction. ... Read more

This thesis was motivated by my own experiences growing up as a young Azerbaijani woman in a society where discussions around sexuality, reproductive health, and bodily autonomy are often surrounded by silence, discomfort, and stigma. Like many of my peers, I learned about these topics through fragments of conversation, media, and personal observation—rather than through any formal or comprehensive education. This personal history led to a central guiding question for the project:
Is it possible to talk about sexual health in Azerbaijan in a way that is not seen as an act of rebellion against the culture, but as essential knowledge for making informed decisions about one’s health, relationships, and wellbeing?
The project focuses on young Azerbaijani women aged 18–30, a group often navigating relationships, marriage, and early parenthood with little reliable guidance. The ambition is to create a culturally sensitive and approachable way for women to access accurate knowledge without forcing them into conflict with their values or communities.
An adapted Double Diamond process (Design Council, 2005) was used to structure the project, integrating Culture Sensitive Design (Van Boeijen & Zijlstra, 2020), the Cultura method (Hao, 2019), and the Vision in Product Design (ViP) approach (Hekkert & Van Dijk, 2011). Desk research examined global sex education models, cultural sensitivity strategies, adult learning approaches, and the historical, political, and social narratives shaping gender roles and views on sexuality and health in Azerbaijan.
Field research combined five expert interviews, with two gynaecologists, a menstrual cycle educator, a psychiatrist, and a gender equality consultant/lawyer, with a generative session involving five young Azerbaijani women from urban, highly educated backgrounds. Experts provided insight into medical practices, psychological barriers, education gaps, legal frameworks, and systemic challenges. The generative session used persona creation, influence mapping, and personal timelines to surface lived experiences, trusted and untrusted information sources, and cultural pressures shaping sexual health understanding of young women. The combination of professional expertise and personal narratives revealed both overlapping concerns and distinct priorities: while experts often emphasized factual knowledge and medical accuracy, young women highlighted the need for emotional safety, consent, and relational guidance.
Analysis of this material identified five recurring tensions:
The Ideal Woman vs. Perfectly Human – Cultural ideals of purity, modesty, and reproductive duty contrasted with lived realities.
Learning in the Absence of Formal Education – Fragmented, informal peer networks as primary learning sources.
The More We Hide It, The Louder It Gets – How silence magnifies fascination, stigma, and misinformation.
Navigating a Healthcare (Marketplace) – Accessibility shaped by commercialization, provider attitudes, and cultural barriers.
Tradition vs. Quiet Resistance – The ways young women negotiate autonomy and boundaries within entrenched norms.
These findings informed the design goal formulated at the start of the Define phase:
To empower young Azerbaijani women to navigate cultural narratives about Female Sexuality and Health with confidence, self-respect, and emotional safety — through a learning resource that supports self-awareness, communication, and boundary-setting.
The final concept, Yanımda (“By My Side”), combines a discreet, tactile physical invitation with a private, visually neutral website. The site begins with general topics, anatomy, menstrual health, and relationships, before gradually introducing more open discussions of consent, pleasure, and sexual wellbeing. The tone is empathetic, non-stigmatizing, and paced to let users explore at their own comfort level.
Evaluation with the target group indicated that Yanımda feels approachable, trustworthy, and safe. Experts endorsed its potential to fill critical knowledge gaps while aligning with cultural sensitivities. Recommendations include expanding multilingual access, deepening the content library, and building partnerships with trusted healthcare providers and community spaces.
This work demonstrates that culturally sensitive sexual education in Azerbaijan is both necessary and feasible when rooted in empathy, cultural awareness, and trust-building. By aligning accurate information with values already embedded in the culture, Yanımda offers a foundation for healthier, more confident, and informed decision-making, for both this generation and the next. ... Read more

This project proposes a redesign for the self-sampling test for Chlamydia trachomatis (CT) and Neisseria gonorrhoeae (NG), guided by principles of Design for Emotion. The goal is to uncover the nuanced emotional experiences users encounter during the sampling process and translate these insights into a more user-friendly and supportive design. Through techniques such as micro-emotion scans (MES) and the identification of motivational dilemmas, the research offers a detailed understanding of users’ emotional experiences during key stages of the process. These findings inform a redesign that promotes emotional ease, addresses motivational conflicts, and empowers users to trust their ability to carry out the test correctly.

Sexually transmitted infections (STIs) such as CT and NG remain a significant public health concern, particularly among sexually active young adults. To promote early detection and treatment, the GGD Amsterdam provides a home-based self-sampling test, enabling users to collect their own samples in the privacy of their homes instead of a general practitioner’s office or a GGD location.
While self-sampling offers greater discretion and accessibility, it can also evoke negative emotional responses, such as doubt, insecurity, or anxiety, that may undermine users’ confidence in performing the test correctly and influence their interpretation of the results.

Extensive literature, desk and field research is conducted to get a better understanding of the usability and user experience when self-sampling. Findings point out that doubt and insecurity often stem from a lack of medical knowledge, the intimate nature of the procedure, and the absence of direct professional guidance. It is therefore not surprising that many users question their own ability to carry out the sampling correctly or worry about compromising the reliability of the results. Acknowledging and understanding these emotions is important. Examining them more closely offered valuable insights for improving the overall user experience and building greater confidence in the test through thoughtful design.

The proposed redesign (the Stepwise kit) was evaluated through user testing, a micro-emotion scan, and qualitative interviews. Results suggest the kit positively impacts users’ self-efficacy, with participants reporting increased confidence in their sampling. This was mostly due to the step-by-step guidance, progress tracking, and focused information delivery. However, the evaluation also revealed a tension between minimizing cognitive load and the need for users to anticipate upcoming steps in a motive dilemma. These insights informed a set of recommendations for further development, emphasizing the importance of consistent usability
for creating a design that supports the user’s self-efficacy beliefs. ... Read more

This project explores how menopause shapes women’s lives and relationships, with a focus on the Polish cultural and social. Although menopause is usually treated as a medical issue, the research approaches it as a broader life transition that affects how women see themselves, relate to others, and navigate social expectations. Using feminist methodologies, ethics of care, and participatory design, the project looks at how women make sense of this transition and what kinds of support or understanding they need. Conversations with women showed that menopause is something they manage on several levels at once: internally, through shifts in identity and bodily change; within their close relationships; and in relation to wider structures like healthcare and society. Across these layers, women described not only silence but a lack of mental and emotional space to process what they are going through. This pointed to a need for tools that make conversations about menopause easier.

In response, the project developed a mother–daughter conversation kit that uses embroidery as a medium for slowing down, paying attention, and talking while making something together. Inspired by ideas such as Tim Ingold’s “making as knowing” and Donna Haraway’s “making kin,” the kit treats craft not only as a technique but as a way of relating. Testing the kit with mother–daughter pairs in Warsaw showed that it helped open up conversations that would not have happened otherwise. Participants described the process as intimate, grounding, and surprisingly nice once they began. They also saw potential for the kit to be used beyond family relationships, in community or workplace settings.

Rather than offering a final answer, the project suggests a different way of approaching menopause—one that values connection, shared time, and everyday forms of care. It asks whether talking about menopause could become less of a taboo and more of a normal part of life when supported by gentle, culturally grounded tools.
... Read more

This thesis addresses the “orgasm gap” for young women (18–30) in heterosexual relationships by shifting the design focus from orgasm as an outcome to the conditions that make pleasure possible. Early exploration showed that many women’s difficulties were less about technique and more about overthinking, shame, body image concerns, and misattuned partner dynamics. In response, the project reframes the goal: not to guarantee orgasm, but to widen the mental and relational space in which pleasure – and, when it happens, orgasm – can emerge without pressure.

Using a design-led qualitative approach, the project combines a diary study (n=7), post-diary interviews (n=3), a brief co-ideation session (n=2), and expert consultation with four sexologists. Data were analyzed thematically, leading to three “enabling levers”: psychological bandwidth (reducing overthinking and performance monitoring), relational attunement (emotional safety and clearer erotic communication), and a pleasure-first reframing (bringing solo know-how and fantasy into partnered contexts without treating orgasm as the finish line). These levers informed a substantial redesign of an A5 Intimacy Diary, including revised pacing, tone, grounding cues, and communication scaffolds, and the development of a grassroots distribution strategy (QR codes, targeted placement, Instagram) to support real-world uptake.

Participants described the diary’s short, pause-able prompts and non-judgmental tone as helping them name barriers, feel less “in their head,” and initiate clearer, kinder conversations with partners. Experts judged the approach as realistic and ethically sound for mild-to-moderate difficulties, and aligned with clinical emphasis on pacing and attunement rather than performance. The thesis contributes: (1) a reframed design goal – from “achieve orgasm” to “build enabling conditions for pleasure”; (2) a tangible, self-guided tool that operationalizes this reframing in everyday life; and (3) a grassroots pathway that situates the diary as a living artifact rather than a closed, one-off intervention. Limitations include a small, Delft-based sample and the need to test long-term impact and referral pathways in more diverse contexts. ... Read more