Designed by Sophie Parmenter and Dido Milne, The National Autistic Society Garden seeks to capture an autistic person’s everyday experience of the world, using walls of cork to create a series of spaces dedicated to different types of social interaction - at work, with friends and family, with partners, and with ourselves.
It highlights a strategy called ‘masking’ – a potentially draining process involving consciously or unconsciously hiding autistic characteristics in order to fit in. The cork ‘masks’ encircle a central sanctuary with a mesmeric kinetic sculpture, alluding to the inner mind’s complexity and beauty.
