About Us
What makes design that delights? This blog explores the biology behind human responses to the world around us. In the 21st Century, new information from neuroscience, psychology, and biology is exploding, giving us new insight into why we like what we do in the built environment and shun what we don’t. It also gives us the chance to create more successful places for people. For, to paraphrase Steve Jobs, the better we understand the ‘human experience’, the better we can design for it. Passionate about making better places for people – whether in city, suburb or spots in between – the Genetics of Design celebrates design that fits human nature and Nature herself.
Ann + Janice

Ann Sussman is an architect, biometric researcher, speaker, writer, and co-author with Justin B. Hollander of Cognitive Architecture, Designing for How We Respond to the Built Environment. (Routledge, 2015, 2nd edition, 2021 ) and Urban Experience + Design, Contemporary Perspectives on Improving the Public Realm (Routledge, 2021), She has taught classes on human perception at the Boston Architectural College, and most recently the, School of Architecture and Planning at Catholic University of America (CUA). In 2020, she co-founded The Human Architecture + Planning Institute, Inc., (theHapi.org) to improve our understanding of how people function and design better places for them, and currently serves as its President.
email: ann@thehapi.org
twitter:@ann_sussman

Janice M. Ward
Janice M. Ward, a writer, web designer, photographer and STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Math) education advocate follows her muse at the intersection of science and art.
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