I wanted the Disabled Body to be an integral part of this exhibition to challenge and redress the representation we have experienced as viewers in the past. I needed a trusted partner to support the research, development and framing of this, and I felt supported every step of the way by Sinéad, Laia and the team at Tilting the Lens. Additionally, Sinéad has been an authentic advocate, advisor, and champion for the Costume Institute, for the Met team, and for our partners and stakeholders.
Increasing representation and accessibility at The Met’s Costume Institute
A collaborative approach to centring the Disabled Body in the ‘Costume Art’ exhibition.
Project Overview
The Costume Institute is a curatorial department within The Metropolitan Museum of Art (The Met) which cares for the more than 33,000 objects of fashionable dress and accessories in The Met’s vast collection. Over an 18-month period, Tilting the Lens proudly collaborated with Andrew Bolton, Curator in Charge at the Costume Institute, and the wider Met team to support their spring 2026 exhibition, ‘Costume Art’.
The ‘Costume Art’ exhibition (May 10, 2026 – January 10, 2027) explores depictions of the dressed body across the Museum’s collection, pairing garments with artworks to form connections that reveal the enduring relationship between clothing and the body, and fashion as an embodied artform. The exhibition is organised into a series of thematic body types that reflects how they have endured through time and different cultures, including some that have traditionally been overlooked, such as the ‘Disabled Body’. Tilting the Lens’ primary objective in this work was to support The Costume Institute through a range of services including consulting on the curation of the ‘Disabled Body’ section, contributing to the department’s research on disability representation within The Met’s wider collection, advising on elements of the exhibition catalogue, additional training Museum volunteer guides, and supporting greater accessibility in the exhibition.
The goal
It was important to Andrew and the curatorial team that ‘Costume Art’ examine historic imbalances in artistic representation within The Met’s collection. They wanted to expand the range of designers’ work featured in the exhibition and The Costume Institute’s holdings, and highlight the connection between art, clothing, and the body across centuries of creative output.
Cultural spaces have historically excluded the Disabled body, presenting a key opportunity for institutions and organisations to invest, partner, and collaborate to address these absences. A consistent barrier to diverse representation in fashion exhibitions has been the availability of mannequins representing different body types, along with the inflexibility of the mannequin-making process, which often restricts the poses and range available to curators when displaying garments on Disabled bodies. It was a priority for The Costume Institute that the mannequins in ‘Costume Art’ reflect the diversity of embodied experiences with fashion.
Additionally, the department expressed a desire to build upon its existing resources for volunteer guides to help ensure that they were confident and further equipped to discuss disability and support guests with varying access needs.
Our approach
Guided by The Costume Institute, Tilting the Lens applied a holistic approach to the project, utilising four of our core services, research, strategy, design, and training.
Research
To ensure the ‘Disabled Body’ section was as broad and representative as possible, Tilting the Lens researched design archives for disability-related collections and explored the lived experiences of Disabled designers. This research helped inform curatorial’s pairings of fashions with artworks from other Met departments, sparking new conversations about where Disabled bodies have historically been depicted in art.
Strategy
Tilting the Lens provided strategic framing for this section of the exhibition and catalogue, centring themes of Disability Rights, Disability Pride, and Disability Justice. The intentional naming of ‘Disabled Body’ was an exercise in reclamation, designed to challenge ableist euphemisms.
Design
Tilting the Lens participated in trialing an innovative photogrammetry casting process, which allowed diverse mannequins, including a new digital mannequin of Sinéad Burke, to be created for the exhibition. For this project, the ‘cast’ was done in a cylindrical machine, with 175 cameras placed three inches apart, covering the entire surface area. There was a space inside for the model to step into and every part of the body was captured in the centre of the lenses.
Training
In coordination with The Costume Institute and The Met’s Access team, Tilting the Lens designed and hosted a virtual training programme for the volunteer guides. The sessions covered the models of disability, the use of disability-first terminology, introductions to brief visual descriptions for Blind or low-vision guests, and practical scenarios for supporting visitors who may be over-stimulated or require a place to rest.
Testimonials
Outcome and impact
The ‘Costume Art’ exhibition successfully honours the beauty and validity of the Disabled body, communicating to visitors that disability is an inherent part of the human experience. Pieces by Disabled designers and artists including Justin LeBlanc, Helen Cookman, Lou Linderoth, Nolan Trowe, and Sugandha Gupta are included in the exhibition. The mannequins, which feature polished steel in place of faces, successfully allow visitors to see themselves reflected in the garments and diverse body types. A number of Disabled people’s bodies, including those of Aariana Rose Philip, Sonia Vera, Antwan Tolliver, and Aimee Mullins, are also represented in the exhibition.
A core principle at Tilting the Lens is building legacy memory so that accessibility remains part of an institution’s long-term fabric. To encourage future academic research into the ableism present in design systems, Sinéad Burke donated two garments to the Costume Institute’s permanent collection, ensuring that the Disabled experience remains an accessible resource for future scholars and designers.
The exhibit was profoundly emotional for me. Knowing that the mannequins were modeled on real Disabled people changed everything. It was not abstract. It was not symbolic. It was embodied. It was intimate. It felt like our bodies, so often misunderstood, hidden, corrected, medicalized, pitied, or treated as an inconvenience, were finally being given space, form, beauty, authority, and reverence. I felt enormous pride. Pride in you. Pride in us. Pride in the quiet, radical power of Disabled bodies being present in one of the most important cultural institutions in the world, not as tragedy, not as inspiration, not as an afterthought, but as design, history, politics, elegance, and truth.
(Exhibition visitor) Cara Yar Khan, Senior Advisor, Global Disability Innovation Hub
Further Reading
Reflection
Tilting the Lens and the Met – a story of accessibility and representation in ‘Costume Art’ (opens in a new tab)
A personal reflection from Sinéad and the team about the working on the project
The Met
Visit the Costume Art exhibition (opens in a new tab)
The exhibition runs until January 10, 2027 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York
Digital accessibility research for Blind and low-vision consumers with McKinsey & Co.
Tilting the Lens sourced contributors for McKinsey & Co.’s in-depth qualitative research.
Project overview
As part of Global Accessibility Awareness Month in May 2023, management consultancy McKinsey & Co published extensive research to understand how Blind and low-vision people experience digital platforms and services. Tilting the Lens was proud to support this research, which engaged Blind and low-vision consumers in the US, Germany, and Italy.
The challenge
More than two billion people worldwide are Blind or have low vision [‘Blindness and vision impairment’; WHO, October 13, 2022], and at the moment those people are excluded or have limited access, due to a lack of prioritisation, resourcing and focus on digital accessibility. On the other side of the coin, it is estimated that consumer companies with inaccessible websites or apps lose $6.9 billion annually [‘The Internet is Unavailable’; Nucleus Research, July 2019] – and this number is only expected to rise with the globally ageing population. Clearly, improving accessibility online is of mutual benefit to both consumers and companies.
Online consumer experiences are often heavily driven by two elements: visuals, and the use of a mouse or finger on a touch screen. Photos, videos, and subtle user experience cues steer consumers through digital content, and people with low vision find it challenging to interact with these visual elements if they are low contrast or unclear.
Meanwhile, consumers using screen readers or other assistive technologies have to trust that the underlying code on the website is functioning properly, to communicate (for example) that a button is clickable. Poorly thought-out digital design can be deeply frustrating, or even unusable.
Within the research, we discovered that Blind internet users abandon approximately two-thirds of their e-commerce interactions because of inaccessibility, forcing them to seek out more accessible options elsewhere.
Continuous research, by talking to consumers who have lived experience, is an essential part of making concrete improvements. The specific goal of McKinsey’s project was to understand the digital behaviours and experiences of those who are Blind or have low vision, and turn those understandings into actionable feedback.
The approach
McKinsey & Co and Tilting the Lens worked together to produce qualitative research, recruiting participants from Germany, Italy, and the United States. Tilting the Lens cast the research participants, helped to draft the digital survey, then facilitated online focus groups, and conducted one-to-one interviews where required. All participants were paid for taking part, in line with our ethos that lived experience is intellectual property, and needs to be compensated and valued in kind.
We worked with AIRA, a visual interpreting service, to ensure that all digital materials were accessible. Digital documents were formatted to be screen reader-accessible, while visual descriptions and audio guidance were provided, and follow-up phone calls were offered to anyone who wanted them.
Participants were asked about 12 specific industries, including banking, education, retail, and media, and the replies suggested that all of those industries could do better if they are to build digital trust with Disabled communities. Without it, Disabled consumers will look elsewhere for goods and services.
What does that trust look like? What does digital accessibility for Blind and low-vision consumers mean?
McKinsey asked the users for their definition of digital accessibility, and the response was clear: a seamless experience when using online content. This means that they can view and interact with it using whichever screen reading tech or accessibility device they prefer, and they certainly shouldn’t have to implement workarounds such as asking friends or family for help. Accessibility needs to be integrated into the site design; separate accessible sites or overlays are often inconsistent or ineffective.
The participants in the research reiterated the need to include lived experience contributions in the design and development stages of digital products and services. As one participant in Germany said, “If it is meant to be used by us, it should be influenced by us.”
Outcome & impact
The report from the research, provided by Tilting the Lens, showed that there is an immediate need for companies to implement tangible solutions in digital accessibility. A lot of them are at the beginning of this journey, and need to do more, now.
Accessibility shouldn’t be about sticking on a solution after the fact; it’s about a customer-first approach right from the beginning. Good design goes hand-in-hand with inclusive design, using bedrock approaches such as collaborative design, cohesive user experience, and continuous improvement. Ensuring that those with lived experience are equal collaborators in the process — right from concept — helps companies build top-notch offerings.
This approach is often more cost-effective, too. Barclays found that redesigning its mobile app with accessibility in mind cost one-tenth of the amount of trying to fix accessibility challenges in its existing mobile app. And, once it was released, the app’s ratings more than doubled, as customers broadcast their trust in the product.
We have to make sure that Disabled people are not being shut out of digital spaces. Brands that do the accessibility work will be rewarded with the economic benefits of a consumer base, and an innovative talent pool who trusts them.