The Challenge

Human-Centered Design (HCD), while widely used, often reproduces existing power structures. Decisions are made by designers or funders, while community voices remain secondary. For Indigenous communities, this means their values, knowledge systems, and lived experiences are often overlooked, diluted, or tokenized. The challenge was:

How might we shift traditional HCD design practice so that Indigenous ways of knowing, being, and decision-making lead the process rather than adapt to it?
What began as an effort to define what “Indigenizing Design” could mean in practice has since grown into a multi-stage initiative. Across three projects, we developed a framework with community partners, tested its application with Indigenous students, and expanded its reach into higher education. Together, these projects demonstrate how design can shift from concept to practice to systems-level change.

Key questions as defined by the community.

Project 1: Defining the Framework

In partnership with CahokiaPHX and the Indigenous Community Collaborative, we co-created the first Indigenizing Design Framework. Through focus groups, creative mapping exercises, and consensus-driven synthesis, Indigenous artists and entrepreneurs defined what Indigenizing meant to them. From this, we developed six Indigenizing Markers, an Ecosystem Map, and an Indigenizing Curriculum. These outputs became both a language for Indigenous practitioners to reclaim authorship in design and a guide for non-Indigenous designers to engage respectfully in collaboration.

Funder: National Endowment of the Arts Design Grant 2022

Community Partner: CahokiaPHX Art and Tech Space

Project 2: Testing with Indigenous Students

Led entirely by Codefy.org and Indigenous partners, this 12-week workforce program applied the Indigenizing Design framework with Indigenous students. Participants explored identity and used the six Markers to shape their own projects, building both skills and a shared vocabulary for empowerment. I contributed as a judge in the design competition, and as a documenter toward the end. The project validated the framework in a youth context and highlighted accessibility tweaks, while keeping authorship firmly with the community.

Funder: Bhatia Foundation

Community Partner: Codefy.org

Technology solutions built by students of the Codefy Workforce program for the Indigenizing Design Challenge

Project 3: Scaling into Higher Education

The third project brought the work into academic institutions, including Arizona State University and Savannah College of Art and Design. With Indigenous and non-Indigenous students, we facilitated workshops on identity, worldviews, and Indigenizing markers, while piloting adaptations of the curriculum for higher education. These sessions highlighted how academic spaces can be reframed to honor Indigenous voices and histories, while also preparing future designers to engage equitably across cultural contexts. This stage demonstrates how the framework can operate at a systems level, moving from community and youth programs into the structures that shape design education itself.

Funder: National Endowment of the Arts Design Grant 2024

Community Partner: Arizona State University’s Labriola Center, and Office of American Indian Projects

What’s Next for Indigenizing Design

Each phase built directly on the last. Project 1 defined the framework; Project 2 tested it in practice with students, refining accessibility and relevance; and Project 3 scaled the work into higher education, embedding Indigenizing Design into institutional conversations and creative practice. Taken together, they illustrate a progression from definition to application of the process.

The next steps build on this trajectory. We will be continuing to adapt and test the curriculum with Indigenous communities and academic partners, and exploring how the framework might influence workforce development and design pedagogy. Ultimately, our vision is to establish Indigenous leadership and knowledge as foundational to design collaboration—not as an addition, but as the starting point from which innovation takes root.

Helping to develop this framework for Indigenizing Design has allowed me to understand how to better communicate and implement the foundation of Indigenous values that inform my worldview and behaviors. This work validates my community and myself by showing us that our traditional ways can be a tenacious force for building a more intentional society centered around community. I am ecstatic to see how other Indigenous communities and allies will add to this data, creating an ever-evolving web of Indigenized knowledge sharing.

- Michael Vargas, Chickasaw/Xicanx, Co-facilitator and participant.

My Role

For this work, I played the role of design guide and documenter in all three phases, and as a facilitator in Phases 1 and 3. Specifically, I:

Scoped and framed research guides, selecting methodologies that balanced HCD tools with Indigenous decision-making practices.
Co-designed and facilitated focus groups and workshops with community members, students, and academic partners.
Led synthesis processes that translated complex qualitative data into frameworks, tools, and curricula that communicated insights to funders, students, and academic institutions.
Adapted the design process and engagement strategies to fit each context (community setting, youth cohort, higher education) while preserving Indigenous leadership.
Documented processes and outcomes, capturing reflections, artifacts, and guidelines to build transparency, continuity, and shared learning across partners.

In addition to this project work, I also documented and shared our learnings publicly through two blog posts on Catapult Design’s site: Community Leading the Design Process in Indigenizing Design and Building Design and Research Activities with Community Partners. I have also co-presented this work at the AIGA Phoenix Design Week with Brian Skeet in 2023.

© Haleemah Sadiah 2026

I help mission-driven organizations and funders identify and transform complex community insights into clear strategy, actionable frameworks, and co-designed futures.