CINCINNATI — A Cincinnati-based publisher has created the first astronomy publication designed from the ground up to be accessible to both sighted and visually-impaired readers.
Clovernook Press, the world's largest producer of braille materials, has operated in Cincinnati for 123 years. Instead of creating separate braille versions of existing books, this time the company decided to try something entirely new.
"So instead of producing a braille version of a book that already existed and having a braille book as something separate, we wanted to publish a new book that had accessibility features in every version," said Samuel Foulkes from the Clovernook Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired.
Watch to get a look at the book and its designs:
The publisher partnered with astronomer Dean Regas to create All About Orion, a book that brings constellations to life through innovative, tactile features.
The book includes transparent pages with braille embossed throughout, allowing readers to feel the outlines of the star patterns.
"They approached me about this project to do an astronomy book and this is the one that I think we all fell in love with, because Orion is such a great constellation and people can get a real good feel for what it's like," Regas told me.
The development process required creative problem-solving to make astronomical concepts tangible.
"Ideas that we were bouncing around here in this very room to try to figure out," Regas said. "How do we make the stars like that come alive basically on the pages."
However, the book isn't exclusively designed for the visually impaired. The creators wanted any child to be able to pick it up and learn about astronomy.
"There's also a section in the back where you can create your own constellation so we have the tactile starfield, where you can run your fingers over the stars and let your imagination fill in the blanks and you can create your own constellation," Regas said.
For Clovernook, the project represents a broader mission of accessibility and equality in education.
"This all gets back to this idea of accessibility and equality for readers so that someone who is blind is just as capable as someone who is sighted when it comes to learning — learning about space, learning about the stars," Foulkes said.
Early funding for this innovative printing style was supported by a grant from the Scripps Howard Fund, part of our parent company, the E.W. Scripps Company.
Love astronomy? You can learn more about Regas, his other publications and upcoming events here. All About Orion is currently only available online, but you can find it here.
This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
