Hi, I'm Lia.
Designer and researcher in participatory, service and systemic design.
Currently with UN Global Pulse Asia Pacific and Women's World Banking, and exploring PhD opportunities in AI as design material for the
participatory and collective processes.
RECENT RESEARCH
Magic Easel: Environment-Grounded Visual Inspiration for GenAI Creativity Support NordiCHI 2026 WELDAR: Augmenting Live Hands-On Training with In-Situ Guidance for Novice Learners CHI 2026 · Best Paper Honorable Mention Origami Sensei: A Mixed Reality AI-Assistant CHI 2025 Mydea: Personally Meaningful Objects Change How People Arrive at Ideas, Not What Ideas Look Like Under review · CHI 2027 Kinship Co-Op: Designing Support Network for Grandparents Raising Grandchildren in Underresourced Community MDes Thesis · CMU 2025Featured
Magic Easel
A drawing easel that turns objects in the room into AI-generated inspiration, projected at the edge of the paper. People branched into new ideas far more often than when drawing alone.
Co-Designing Kinship Co-Op
A cooperative support network co-designed with grandmothers raising their grandchildren in Hazelwood, Pittsburgh, using systems mapping and an exchange board game. Tangible prototypes were tested with the community.
Mydea
A follow-up to Magic Easel that draws AI inspiration from people's personally meaningful objects. Tested with designers and non-designers, it changed how people arrived at ideas, not what the ideas looked like.
Origami Sensei
An AI folding teacher that recognizes your step and projects the next fold onto your paper. Beginners finished faster and stayed more engaged than with video tutorials.
The Botanist
A multi-sensory learning experience for a botanical garden: a smart magnifying glass, and a table that uses a custom-trained model to recognize real leaves and turn them into a learning game.
D.Sole
Research with podiatrists and dashboard improvements for a smart insole that monitors diabetic feet, shifting it from showing sensor data to guiding clinicians' next steps.
RTI AI Decision-Making Dashboard [WIP]
Design research for Real-Time Indicators, a social welfare data platform: interviews, sensemaking workshops, workflow mapping and service blueprints with three national government agencies.
WELDAR [WIP]
An XR tool that gives novice welders in-situ guidance during live, hands-on training. Co-designed and iteratively developed with Dina El-Zanfaly and Daragh Byrne.
Business Formalization Project [WIP]
Systemic design research and sensemaking workshops with four national ministries and agencies on business registration and micro-credit access for women micro-merchants.
Leveraging QRIS for Digital Footprint [WIP]
Field research and co-design with women micro-merchants and Indonesia's largest state-owned bank on QRIS merchant activation, tested through usability testing and a multi-city pilot.
Awards and Recognitions
- 2026CHI Best Paper Honorable Mention
- 2025Kier Service Design and Social Innovation Award, CMU School of Design
- 2025GuSH Research Grant, Carnegie Mellon University
- 2024Merit Award, CMU School of Design
- 2016Berkeley Prize for Architecture and Design Excellence, first Indonesian recipient