Design Activism

This lecture I want to associate with my current group project. Our project about Deptford community.

Deptford is a rapidly evolving area undergoing a huge regeneration. However, its deep history is rooted in the local residents; a diverse group of individuals, with many wondering how the area will shape in the future.

We have barely any experience of Deptford, and so we do not want to try and tell the area’s history; instead, we want to design an action where residents and visitors can create history. We want to share a story told by the voices of those living in Deptford today.

Deptford is unique, as it is a small home of cultural diversity, with residents from many different nationalities. Everyone has taken different paths, journeys and experiences to congregate in this same place.

By interviewing people’s stories, memories, experiences and facts about their journey to Deptford, we wish to fragment these conversations and randomly arrange new sentences from these broken conversations to create another story.

We want to push the boundaries between private and public space, so it will be possible for people to participate in a private way, in order to contribute to a public event.

The installation will become an interactive stage; seen as a performance in which you participate both as actor and audience.

The performance will be executed in the form of silhouettes from shadows and sound. The shadows will act as a disguise, allowing each person to act without being “seen”. Each person’s contribution and participation will make the plot.

A similar effect will be created with an audio installation. Conversations with Deptford residents about their journey there will be recorded and randomly shuffled. By re-mixing their stories, they will become less private, but will not lose their context. Even though it will be nearly impossible to determine the flow of the original conversations, the words will remain the same, and the story changes from being an individual’s to a community’s. People can find their stories on Deptford website, which we create to tell people stories, history, facts about Deptford area.

As the spatial intervention will take place in a Christmas Market, we want to keep with these visual and atmospheric themes by creating a cosy installation with narrative voices, light and movement. The installation will communicate ideas of sharing and being together.

Laser cutting

3-D printers are an exciting technology, but another hot new tool may have just as significant of an impact in real-world projects.
Laser cutters were invented almost 50 years ago, but only became part of the home workshop in the past few years. It is a technology that uses a laser to cut materials, and is typically used for industrial manufacturing applications. Laser cutting works by directing the output of a high-power laser, by computer, at the material to be cut.
If makers want to experiment with creative ideas that need to be produced with engineering-grade plastics, wood, leather, metal, or even food, laser cutters are often the only appropriate tool.

objects 05-06' surface studies by daniel widrig (laser cut paper)

http://www.treehugger.com/sustainable-product-design/downloading-designs-generatorx-20.html#13894745301981&action=collapse_widget&id=8860336

SLICE / CHAIR PLYWOOD, Mathias Bengtsson

http://www.bengtssondesign.com/

algorithmic pattern laser cut into metal from ouno design.

http://blog.ounodesign.com/

 

Last year, I had an experience with the laser cutting at our university. Two times I've turned to this technique if the first time I did it successfully, then the second time was a failed. For the first project, I used a piece of wood and i  I burnt out a map of places where I was doing the project. The second project I used thick paper, but even that did not help because my drawing was too small and complex, so it all crumbled.

Design that Explores Cleaner/Better Technologies

This weeks lecture was about design that explores cleaner,better technologies. How can we use new emerging technology + nature to make sustainable design.

The way which, I tell you  it is naturel and do not need to spend anything. Biomimicry is a new science that studies nature and attempts to imitate it within design in a sustainable way. It is believed that nature has already solved many of the problems we are dealing with at the moment.
Many designers are studying bee's in nature to mimic the way they create their nests/hives. One designer has created a series of limited edition vases, the process is called ‘slow prototyping’. The designer allows the bee's to make their honeycomb hives in the shape of vases.

'Slow prototyping'

http://www.biomimicryinstitute.org

Suzanne Lee is a London based fashion designer working on fashion and future technologies.

She is a Senior Research Fellow at Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design and the Director of The BioCouture Research Project. Lee's latest garment - which uses these growing textiles - is the 'biocouture' jacket made from cellulose. Instead of coming from plants, the cellulose is produced by millions of tiny bacteria grown in bathtubs of sweet green tea.

Her pioneering project which demonstrates growth of a biomaterial using nothing other tan sugary tea and bacteria, will also be presented at this time. the 'eco-textile' is grown in flat sheets which are then cut to shape, sewn together or moulded over 3D forms.

jacket sleeve seam detail

I really want to try a new technology for myself it is 3D printing. I had never used this method in my models and projects, but I think it is a very useful way to present your ideas in a three-dimensional solid object of virtually any shape from a digital model. 3D printing is also considered distinct from traditional machining techniques, which mostly rely on the removal of material by methods such as cutting or drilling. It has been speculated that 3D printing may become a mass market item because open source 3D printing can easily offset their capital costs by enabling consumers to avoid costs associated with purchasing common household objects.

http://www.freedomofcreation.com

http://on3dprinting.com/2012/06/17/belgian-design-studio-unfold-features-beautiful-ceramic-3d-printing/

Patrick Jouin's 3D-Printed Bloom Table Lamp Opens Like a Flower

Future applications for 3D printing might include creating open-source scientific equipment or other science-based applications like reconstructing fossils in paleontology, replicating ancient and priceless artifacts in archaeology, reconstructing bones and body parts in forensic pathology, and reconstructing heavily damaged evidence acquired from crime scene investigations. The technology is even being explored for building construction.
In 2011 I was visited London Design Festival, an installation, curated by Murray Moss and focused on 3D Printing, was held in the Victoria and Albert Museum (the V&A). The installation was called Industrial Revolution 2.0: How the Material World will Newly Materialize.

A 3-D–printed replica of a 19th-century bust, with a hat by Stephen Jones, which was shown at London’s Victoria and Albert Museum

This is the Melonia shoe, 14 pairs of which currently surround the hot and sexy Bed of Ware at the Victoria & Albert Museum, as part of the big 3D printing installation

Processes invented using cleaner/better technologies & models from nature:

Light - Using light technology to cut, engrave & stick: laser cutting, laser etching, laser welding

Water - Using water to cut: jet cutting

Sound- Using Sound to stick:Ultrasonic welding

Heat- using heat to stick, cut and melt: welding, plasma cutting, reforming,chemical re-processing of polyester

Nano technology, shape memory alloys, magnetic shape, self-healing materials

Zero waste- Using every scrap: 3D warp knitting- on knitting machine all bits knitted together creating structure & form

Printing - 2D printing

3D printing- Spray on shape, Spray on fabric