Empowering design leaders, educators, and practitioners with thoughtful and strategic guidance on trauma-informed design, research, and practice.

Our services

  • We are a trusted and respected leader with 25 years of experience in the social impact, education, and government spaces. We consult and advise on some of the most complex challenges of our time.

    Consulting is ideal for project-based work where we are providing our expertise, strategic insights, and responsible solutions.

    Consulting and strategy can include:

    • Trauma-informed design and research facilitation

    • Organizational assessments for care and psychological safety

    • Developing frameworks and integrating practices for care-centered design and practice

  • Our ‘design care’ coaching aligns with promising practices in mentorship, support, and guidance. Design Care might be one-on-one, team-based, or organization-wide support to help practitioners grow in their practice.

    Coaching and mentoring can include:

    • Individual, small group, and team supervision (similar to social work’s clinical supervision models)

    • Mentorship for integrating trauma-informed principles into design and research

    • Guidance on building sustainable, care-centered practices

  • Our teaching and facilitation includes educational engagements where we lead workshops, courses, and speaking engagements to share our practice experience and expertise.

    Teaching and facilitation can include:

    • Designing and delivering workshops on trauma-responsive design

    • Teaching care-focused methodologies for design and research

    • Facilitating learning engagements on integrating social work principles into design

  • With over 25 years of experience in social work, design, and public service, our founder brings unparalleled expertise and strategic insight to help organizations navigate complex challenges.

    As a Design Council expert and a fellow with the RWJF Social Work Futures Lab and the Royal Society of Arts, she excels in fostering innovation, equity, and care-centered practices across diverse sectors.

    She offers senior-level advisory and consulting support tailored to project-based work, delivering thoughtful, actionable strategies that drive meaningful, lasting change.

    Senior-level advisory and consultation offerings include:

    • Strategic guidance for trauma-informed design and research initiatives

    • High-level support for developing care-centered organizational frameworks

    • Advising on design futures, social work futures, and care futures across teams and systems

  • We can help you focus on developing educational experiences and frameworks tailored to meet the needs of organizations, teams, or academic institutions.

    We can help you with:

    • Guest lectures, visiting critiques, and week- or semester-long ‘professor of practice’ engagements* built from 2+ decades of practice experience.

    • Designing trauma-informed training programs for design, research, and leadership teams

    • Creating curricula for workshops, courses, and learning engagements focused on responsible and care-centered practices

    • Developing frameworks for integrating social work values and principles into design education

    • Advising on curriculum adaptation for values-aligned, equity-centered learning experiences


    *At this time, Rachael is only able to offer an extremely limited amount of unpaid guest lectures. Please consider how we all must model fair and equitable compensation for practitioner experience and expertise.

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Practice makes pattern

Our practice also includes writing and reflecting on several topics, including the value of social workers in design and public interest tech, responsible design leadership, healthy and sustainable work environments, and trauma responsive design, research, and practice.

Here is a small sampling of some of our publications:

 

Trauma Literacy in Content Design

A chapter in the book “Designed with Care: Creating Trauma-Informed Content,” edited by Rachel Edwards and independently published in December 2024. Several chapters are available for free on the website. The book is available worldwide through Amazon.

On Trauma Informed Design

An interview with Alison Place and included in “Feminist Designer: On the Personal and the Political in Design, published by The MIT Press in September 2023.

Trauma-Informed Interviewing Considerations and Approaches

A paper co-authored with Melanie Sage, included in “Issues of Equity: Key Concepts in Qualitative Research Methods,” published by Routledge Press in April 2025.

The Call for Trauma-Informed Design Research and Practice

A highly-read short paper included in a special Civic Design Futures issue of dmi:Review and released in June 2022.

How we price our services

  • Our pricing is grounded in a values-based approach to ensure equitable access to trauma-informed design services while acknowledging the depth of expertise and care we bring to each engagement. Rates are adjusted to reflect the type of organization, project scope, and impact goals.

    A note about historical undervaluation

    As a licensed clinical social worker and designer, Rachael’s work is informed by years of training, education, applied practice, and lived experience at the intersections of care, equity, and design.

    Historically, social workers have been underpaid and undervalued, despite the critical expertise we bring to creating meaningful, sustainable change. Our pricing reflects a commitment to fair compensation for this often-overlooked labor while ensuring accessibility for organizations working toward social good.

  • We are committed to accessibility and offer hourly engagements on a sliding scale. Rates are adjusted based on organizational size and budget capacity.

    Below is a rough estimate of hourly rates:

    • Students and Individual Coaching: $0–$350/hour

    • Small Organizations & Nonprofits: $150–$300/hour

    • Academic Institutions: $300–$450/hour

    • Corporate Clients & Consulting Firms: $400–$750/hour

    *Please note that the rates noted above are subject to change and based on needs, capacity, and complexity.

  • For larger projects or ongoing engagements, we offer tiered pricing based on scope. The ranges typically fall within the following:

    • Short-Term Projects (e.g., a one-time workshop or review): $5,000–$10,000

    • Mid-Term Engagements (e.g., multi-session training or curriculum design): $15,000–$25,000

    • Long-Term Retainers (e.g., monthly consulting): $5,000–$10,000/month

  • We tailor our pricing to match the scope and impact of each project. Our rates reflect the value of our expertise and our clients' budgetary realities, ensuring fairness and accessibility.

    By adjusting our rates based on client size and resources, we can maintain equity in our practice, ensuring accessibility for smaller organizations while scaling our services for larger institutions.

Contact Us

Designing with care

We are passionate about connecting and empowering individuals, organizations, communities, and systems through social work values and care by design.

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