The Essence of Multi-sensory Design: Felt, remembered, connected

Multi-sensory design is about multiple points of entry, multiple senses interacting simultaneously, where content is not confined to a single medium. 

The experience approach creates an emotional connection, serving as a bridge or orchestrator between nostalgia and future recollections, shaping concepts and developing innovative and accessible products. While technology and design trends continue to evolve, our fundamental desire for transformative experiences remains constant.

The senses (sight, sound, touch, smell and taste) are unique to each person and mix with personal memory, where a design can turn the intangible into something you felt, remembered or connected with. Multi-sensory design blends two or more senses to support the diversity of the human condition and human interaction. The combinations of sensory inputs can change each other, create cross-connections between each other and create inclusive, immersive spaces for health and well-being.

Multi-sensory design focuses on balancing combinations of senses to craft comprehensive and memorable experiences that shape how people feel and remember an interaction with a brand, product or space. Each sense plays a role, and when two or more are combined, they mutually change one another:

• Sight: Visual elements such as colour, typography and imagery which set the visual hierarchy and guide attention with visual storytelling.
• Sound: Auditory elements such as voice, music and ambient or nuanced sounds can impact perception, create atmosphere and elicit emotional responses.
• Touch: Tactile elements such as texture, weight and materials contribute to the user experience, providing interaction, navigation and realism.
• Smell: Scents and fragrances can create ambience and evoke a memory or emotion that adds to a user's perception of a brand or experience.
• Taste: Taste influences flavour perception and interacts with the other senses to trigger emotions such as comfort and nostalgia.

Below are some examples of multi-sensory design in action that balance sensory engagement and anchor memory and retention.

Shifting the act of seeing 

Renowned light artist James Turrell created a Skyspace, “As Seen Below – The Dome,” as an immersive experience at the Aros Aarhus Art Museum. His work transforms the sky, inviting visitors to experience the light as tangible, as a physical presence, that creates an active meeting of light, space and personal senses. The experience features three operating modes—Open Sky, Colour Shift and Twilight—as distinct states of light and perception.

Throughout his practice, James achieves amplified perception in controlled spaces as a multi-sensory experience through lighting techniques, architecture, multimodal setups and cognitive science. The impact of blurring the boundary between where space ends and light begins lets the viewer become part of the art and experience new sensations, contemplation and emotions.

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Feel, look and hear typography

Ran Zheng's project “Look/Hear” explores the relationship between looking and hearing by using sound to affect 3D typographic forms. Her letters as 3D geometry create a system of real-time morphing with the letters, where different sounds trigger reactions and associations. Using sound scenes from everyday life (a park, a street, a café, a subway and an office), you can experience city noise translated interactively on typography—real-time altering of the scale, shape, weight and curvature of letterforms.

By treating typography as fluid and adaptive, where we interpret sound individually, a multi-sensory experience is encountered. When the letters dynamically alter and shift, they become signifiers of emotion, mood and environment, which associate connections and familiarity.

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Creative playground of visible-invisible 

.Oddity Fragrance, a contemporary niche perfume house, presents more than just a product but an immersive multi-sensory experience, triggering inspiration and stretching the senses. Smell is not perceived the same way by every individual but draws from one's own intangible moments, memories and associations.

.Oddity perfume bottles are topped with unique caps crafted by hand, where the bottle itself lends itself to the beauty of imperfections, being a bridge to the scent. Each fragrance guides toward a particular scent impression while leaving room for individual meaning based on our physical and emotional worlds.

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Building flavour through the senses 

Kitchen Theory, a leading culinary design studio, explores multi-sensory gastronomy through immersive experiences and how multi-sensory design transforms the way we experience food. Our relationships with food are formed through our unique makeup of memories, senses and experiences. At Kitchen Theory, inspired by a study by psychologist Wolfgang Köhler, the Bouba & Kiki dish composition splits the plate into two sensory profiles: Bouba is rounded, sweet and fatty while Kiki is sharp, acidic and crisp. The two contrasting halves create a cross-modal correspondence with the idea that you can “taste shapes.”

Merging culinary arts with design, psychology and neuroscience, this approach to food uses all five senses to form a sensory relationship that shapes our perception of flavour. In a multi-sensory dining experience, every aspect of a meal, from the sounds, smells and settings to the stories, shapes how we experience food.

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Cultivating relaxed alertness 

Nike Mind Technology, developed by Nike's Mind Science Department, is a neuroscience-based footwear platform designed to support pre-game routine and post-game recovery for athletes. The footwear functions as a tactile touch interface consisting of 22 anatomically mapped foam nodes on the soles of the shoes, activating sensory receptors to enhance mind-body connection.

The unique sensation felt through the feet stimulates the senses and sharpens mental focus through tactile feedback. The tactile design encourages the athlete to slow down, find balance and be present in the moment. With research and examination of how cognitive readiness integrates with physical performance, the footwear was designed thoughtfully in every material and detail to enhance the sensory experience with every step. Instead of communicating speed or forward motion, it has a "directionless" aesthetic that lends itself as a reminder to slow down.

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