Sensory Attunement (or Sensory Interview)

A play design method that encourage students, practitioners and researchers to engage with play materials from their own life, sharing these through collaborative interviews in groups or teams to dissect play characteristics. These mappings can be applied to engage with the embodied and sensory knowledge when designing play concepts.

Preparation 
1–3 hours to collect and curate supplementary material swatches sized to a maximum of 5 × 5 cm. These should be non-figure and include textiles, plastics, foams, woods, metals, organic materials, and other tactile samples (currated to the specific topic of a current design topic or in specific color nuances)

Activity
In teams of three, each participant begins by selecting a material swatch from the curated collection.
In three rounds of 10 minutes each, roles are assigned and then rotated:

• Interviewee: Interacts with and describes the material swatch.
• Interviewer: Asks probing, sensory-focused questions.
• Note taker: Documents surprising moments, metaphors, emotions, and nuances.

Follow-up clarification 
Interviewee: Describe and explore your material through touch, sight, sound, and emotional association—but avoid naming or technically explaining it. Focus on how it feels, what it evokes, how it moves or resists, and what it invites you to do.

Interviewer: Guide the conversation with prompts such as: What does this material remind you of (emotionally, bodily, in memory)? What kind of play does it invite? Is there a mood or rhythm to your interaction with it? How does it change when interacted with differently (e.g., with closed eyes, under your clothes, jumping on it)?

Note taker: Capture metaphors, hesitations, sensory expressions, and playful interpretations. Anything that reveals the unsayable or challenges the limits of descriptive language.

Materials 

• 30–50 curated material swatches (depending on class size)
• Table space for groups
• Paper or alike for note-taking

Energy Level 
Intimate, concentrated.

Researchers/Facilitators 
Facilitate the process, introduce the sensory perspective, and help sustain the playful framing throughout.

Participants 
Between 3-10 groups of 3 participants.

Play(ful) approach 
The method treats material exploration itself as a form of play, inviting curiosity, improvisation, and sensorial immersion.

Expected Output 
The exercise raise awareness towards our sensory and poetic vocabulary that extends beyond standard descriptive language.

Step by step 
Prepare swatches and arrange them in a shared space.

• Form groups of three and explain roles.
• Round 1 (10 min): First person as interviewee, second as interviewer, third as note taker.
• Rotate roles after each round.
• After all rounds, discuss as a group to identify recurring play characteristics.
• Debriefing and shared insights in calss can happen soon after the interviews.

We might be able to explain in words what it means to experience play, yet subtle, and still crucial, nuances often elude language. Many design examples resemble what Wittgenstein once said about clarinets: When we aim to redefine what something is, what we offer is not a new definition, but a concrete design that sounds differently.

This idea—that some knowledge is embodied or sensory and cannot easily be translated into language—raises important questions for design research and practice. It challenges the assumption that definition always relies on verbal explanation. Following Redström and Wittgenstein, this method invites participants to explore how we can foster new ways of knowing through sensory interviews.

By working hands-on with materials, participants bring tacit and emotional knowledge to the forefront, uncovering play characteristics such as mood, rhythm, affordance, resistance, and invitation, which can be reimagined into play design concepts.