University of Limerick Product Design and Technology students to exhibit innovative designs from May 23  

2025 UL Product Design and Technology students to exhibit innovative designs from May 24. Pictured is Aoileann Carmody, Final year student of Product Design and Technology with her product ‘Airsafe’

University of Limerick BSc in Product Design and Technology students to host the 2025 Design @ UL exhibition from Friday, May 234, to Thursday, June 6

An exhibition of work by students from UL’s internationally acclaimed School of Architecture and Product Design will be officially launched in Istabraq Hall, Limerick City, as part of the Design@UL Showcase 2025 from 7pm on Friday, 23 May until Friday, 6 June 2025.

With a launch on Friday, May 23, the exhibition will run at Istabraq Hall  and will be open to the public from Friday, May 23 to Thursday, June 6, daily from 9 am to 5 pm (closed bank holidays).

The exhibition will be freely open to the public and the projects on display span a wide range of applications from sustainability to medical devices. Over 70 student projects from the undergraduate programmes in Architecture and Product Design and Technology, and the MSc in Design for Health and Wellbeing will be on display.

advertisement
advertisement

advertisement
advertisement

advertisement
advertisement

advertisement
advertisement

advertisement
advertisement

advertisement
advertisement

The exhibition opening hours will be limited to the civic office opening hours 9-5 Monday-Friday and closed bank holidays.

The visual exhibition will feature a range of cutting-edge and innovative 3D models created by the UL students with an aim of tackling real-world challenges. Focusing on technology, healthcare, and the built environment, the projects will combine problem-solving and sustainable innovation.

Among the projects on display are initiatives that aim to give blind and visually impaired women autonomy by granting them unprecedented control over the intimate moment of discovering their own pregnancy, new approaches to support and empowerment of the homeless, as well as safer, patient-focused medical intubation solutions.

Leah Shanahan, Final year student of Product Design and Technology, brings her product ‘AMY’ to this year’s exhibition. Leah’s project is a pregnancy test with a difference – designed with the needs of visually impaired women in mind. With AMY, Leah seeks to give these women the autonomy they are currently missing in the very first important step in their pregnancy journey.

AMY addresses a massive gap in the market as a reusable saliva pregnancy test that uses more than one sense to allow blind or visually impaired women to take control over how they discover if they are pregnant.
Access to AMY would eliminate the need for a blind woman to rely on a sighted person to read a pregnancy test and have them share in this very personal and private moment before they are ready.

Leah has always been interested in designing for women’s health, but she is also blind in her left eye, so designing for accessibility is a personal priority for her.

Throughout the design process, Leah worked with a number of visually-impaired women to address the specific needs of her target market.

Leah is a recipient of the HSE Spark Innovation Programme Bursary, which supports young designers who may have an impact on the future of our healthcare system. Her work on AMY will be displayed at The Spark Innovation Programme national showcase on 30 May 2025

Stephen Skerritt, a final-year student of Product Design and Technology, brings ‘NOMARIS’, a product that mitigates emotional and physical stress in rough sleeping.
Stephen’s project takes a compassionate approach to the needs of the homeless.

NOMARIS is a wearable support system designed to empower people experiencing homelessness through emotional regulation and physical comfort.

Stephen was deeply affected by the homelessness crisis in London, where he worked last summer. Working in an exclusive boutique store, dealing with wealthy customers and designer products, he observed a massive disparity in the wealth he encountered at work and the horrific conditions of the homeless individuals he walked past on his trip home every evening.

Designing for homelessness was a massive challenge but Stephen was able to get valuable insights from the homeless as well as a number of homelessness charities Inkling, NOVAS, COPE and The Simon Community.

With layered functionality, the compressive vest combines thermal insulation with deep pressure stimulation (DPS), delivered through a four-layer system that eases muscle tension, regulates body temperature, and calms neural pathways. Inflatable air channels activate the parasympathetic nervous system, helping to reduce anxiety, improve sleep, and restore mental clarity, mitigating the fight-or-flight responses often numbed through substance or alcohol use.

NOMARIS addresses a critical gap in support for rough sleepers: emotional resilience. Rather than offering a temporary fix, it creates the conditions for users to remain engaged with support systems. Giving confidence in mental clarity, a product designed to empower.

Stephen is working on progressing his design further and hopes that eventually his product could be available in shelters in the future.