Cocchiarella, F., 2026.

Para-design: Investigating paranormal phenomena through the design of location-based experience

This research positions Para-design as a deliberately disruptive and transformative approach to design practice, one that agitates the field by challenging conventional assumptions and celebrating alternative worldviews. By using the paranormal as a lens, the research foregrounds the pseudo-scientific, the uncanny and the speculative as legitimate tools for inquiry, translating triggers of extraordinary experiences into material, spatial and experiential forms. Through a tailored design practice, iterative making, immersive installations and transitional objects, methods provoke reflection, imagination and dialogue, encouraging designers to engage with fantasy rationale, belief and the strange in everyday encounters. Central to this practice are psychic products and visionary rumours, objects and scenarios that catalyse storytelling, alternative interpretations and speculative engagement.
The thesis interrogates perceptions of reality, exploring how belief, imagination and culturally informed interpretations shape encounters with space, objects and environments. Drawing on contextual research, experimental psychology, para-anthropology and design thinking, four iterative studies explore psycho-spatial (Jung, 1959) and psycho-geographic (Basset, 2004) phenomena, demonstrating how speculative scenarios, estrangement and imaginative prototyping can foster critical thinking, alternative epistemologies and new ontologies of being. Para-design disrupts normative hierarchies of knowledge by integrating interdisciplinary perspectives from parapsychology to folklore, science and creative practice, positioning design as a platform for investigating complex societal, cultural and metaphysical questions.
By embedding these principles in workshops, collaborative networks and pedagogical approaches, the research demonstrates that design practice can operate as a robust, experimental methodology. Para-design expands the conceptual and operational scope of contemporary design, producing knowledge through material, experiential and speculative interventions and by establishing a field-defining framework for critically imaginative, pluralistic and transformative design inquiry.