Switch by Radi Designers.
Gesture and shape both change the reading and functioning of the object; to cut the power one needs to break the object to interrupt the wire continuity on which it is integrated. It is the shape of the switch that makes sense as much as the sensation of breaking. The gesture is reversible and the switch takes two shapes: straight or bent to define the states: open or close -the usual schematic representations.
If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed to receive the latest Architectradure’s articles in your reader or via email. Thanks for visiting!
Everyone needs to relax a bit from the computer. Let this sweet keyboard show the way …
Chocolate Keyboard by designer Michael Sholk
If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed to receive the latest Architectradure’s articles in your reader or via email. Thanks for visiting!
Everyone needs to relax a bit from the computer. Let this sweet keyboard show the way …
Chocolate Keyboard by designer Michael Sholk
If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed to receive the latest Architectradure’s articles in your reader or via email. Thanks for visiting!
I am thrilled! My proposal for book chapter titled Attachments to artifacts: Collect to connect to construct has been accepted! It will be part of the first Franco-English book that will tell you all you ever wanted to know about new technologies of the self, mobilities and (co-)constructions of identities.
In this book chapter, I’ll explore the psychological trade-off between what we call virtual and tangible “attachments”: I focus on people’s attachments to things, and through things, their relations to people (virtual and digital). I address the digital object collection mechanism in relation to the way we gather artifacts in the physical world.
Edited by Fred Dervin, Senior Lecturer, Department of French Studies, University of Turku, Finland and partner in crime Yasmine Abbas, Doctor of Design, Harvard, USA, ReD Associates, Denmark. The book will be published in Autumn 2009. More info ->here<-
SYNOPSIS extraits/excerpts, in both French and English
L’hypermobilité physique comme virtuelle qui touche les individus contemporains conduit à multiplier les récits et discours sur les rencontres avec les autres, mais aussi avec soi-même. Qu’ils soient issus de migrants, membres de diasporas, réfugiés, personnes en mobilité à court ou long-terme, résidents virtuels, internautes, etc., ces témoignages sont transmis à travers différents média et espaces personnels et publics: du simple coup de téléphone au site internet et à l’e-mail, ou à travers des autobiographies, des témoignages écrits et oraux, des articles de presse, des documentaires, etc. L’avènement de nouveaux espaces relationnels tels que ceux proposés par les Webs 2.0 et 3.0 (weblogs, podcasts, vidéocasts, Facebook, Second Life, Youtube…) offre la possibilité à la fois de faire partager ses expériences de mobilité au quotidien et de construire son soi face à/avec des millions d’interlocuteurs potentiels et ce, de manière multimodale. La présence de ces témoignages de mobilité, qui s’apparentent à des actes de confession, donne accès à des données intéressantes et inédites dans plusieurs langues et cela, de façon illimitée…
The new interpersonal spaces created by web 2.0 and 3.0 technologies seem to correspond to the technologies of the self that Michel Foucault (1988) has addressed in his lectures at the Collège de France at the beginning of the 1980s. These new technologies enable the individual’s self to emerge publicly and to be worked upon with its “disciples”: be they companions in Second Life, readers (for example on a blog) or listeners (Podcasts). With high speed Internet access and increasingly generous capacities of storage (mp3, USB keys, iPhone, portable computers…), the opportunities for staging the self have become unlimited…
MEDIA TREATED blogs, forum, Life Forms, MMS, moblogging, mondes virtuels, photo et vidéo, photos et vidéos mobiles, robots de compagnie, sites Internet, téléphones portables. | Craigslist, digital artifacts, Del.ici.ous, World of Warcrafts, Facebook, Gaming, Geolocalisation, MMORPG, retail surveillance devices, SilkRoad online, Social Networking, YouTube, WWOOF, Second Life.
THEMES Photographies en mobilité, espaces relationnels, hétérogénéité culturelle, industries culturelles, identités migratoires, identité hmong, diaspora, NOTICs (Nouveaux Objets issus des Technologies de l’Information et de la Communication), infoguerre, mouvement en danse, personnage virtuel, avatars, Autre imaginaire, voyage réel et virtuel | Attachment, backpacking, collection, collective identity, participatory culture, politics, rhythm, second self, tourism, tribalism, virtual nomadism. Attachment, backpacking, collection, collective identity, participatory culture, politics, rhythm, second self, tourism, tribalism, virtual nomadism.
I could not help but join this picture sent to us by Edith Ackermann, also selected by Yasmine Abbas, because it directly refers to the ideal of mobility and its beautiful sacrifice. Edith says:” i am in Switzerland moving out from my apartment: a sweet dump i had rented since i am a student, filled with paintings from my grand father, mom’s carpets, and leather coated books. i never had to let go of so many evocative objects at once. a bit overwhelming really, but i guess i will feel lighter once i am done. good i have my “final home” coat, a gift from my japanese friend noboyuki…. objects come, objects go! and so do people 🙂 ” Edith tells us all about it ->here<-
Posted by Cati Vaucelle @ Architectradure
…………………………………………………………………………………
Blog Jouons 
Blog Maison Blog Passion
If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed to receive the latest Architectradure’s articles in your reader or via email. Thanks for visiting!
I present my work on fashion garments designed in the context of technology -including the Touch Sensitive apparel developed with Yasmine Abbas. The book just came out and is available for pre-order on Amazon -> here<-
Abstract: The interplay of electronic textiles and wearable technology, wearables for short, and fashion, design and science is a highly promising and topical subject. Offered here is a compact survey of the theory involved and an explanation of the role technology plays in a fabric or article of clothing. The practical application is explained in detail and numerous illustrations serve as clarification. Over 50 well-known designers, research institutes, companies and artists, among them Philips, Burton, MIT Media Lab, XS Labs, New York University, Hussein Chalayan, Cute Circuit or International Fashion Machines are introduced by means of their latest, often still unpublished, project, and a survey of their work to date. Given for the first time is a list of all the relevant information on research institutes, materials, publications etc. A must for all those wishing to know everything about fashionable technology.
->Buy the book<-
If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed to receive the latest Architectradure’s articles in your reader or via email. Thanks for visiting!
I present my work on fashion garments designed in the context of technology -including the Touch Sensitive apparel developed with Yasmine Abbas. The book just came out and is available for pre-order on Amazon -> here<-
Abstract: The interplay of electronic textiles and wearable technology, wearables for short, and fashion, design and science is a highly promising and topical subject. Offered here is a compact survey of the theory involved and an explanation of the role technology plays in a fabric or article of clothing. The practical application is explained in detail and numerous illustrations serve as clarification. Over 50 well-known designers, research institutes, companies and artists, among them Philips, Burton, MIT Media Lab, XS Labs, New York University, Hussein Chalayan, Cute Circuit or International Fashion Machines are introduced by means of their latest, often still unpublished, project, and a survey of their work to date. Given for the first time is a list of all the relevant information on research institutes, materials, publications etc. A must for all those wishing to know everything about fashionable technology.
->Buy the book<-
If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed to receive the latest Architectradure’s articles in your reader or via email. Thanks for visiting!
An announcement for the good cause. I know how hard it is to find a great PhD in a field that you love! Here is a call for an international PhD studentship in tectonic textiles between the Centre for IT and Architecture at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, School of Architecture, and the Textiles Future Research Group, Central Saint Martins, College of Art and Design.
The position will be based in both research environments so as to make full use of the expertise and equipment available. The applicant will be expected to move between the institutions placed in Copenhagen and London, respectively. The position is offered as a 3-year contract under the regulations of the Danish Ministry of Finance and the Danish Federation of Professional Associations, AC.
This Ph.D. application will be administerd by CITA.
Click ->here<- for further information
The deadline for application is 23 May 2008. Material received by CITA after this time will not be taken into account.
A bit of research context for the studentship
The last decade has seen an extensive development in the textile industry. The invention of new high technology fibres and yarns as well as new fabrication techniques for weaving, knitting, pleating, welding or laminating of materials, is causing an increase in the use of textiles across multiple disciplines. From the miniature detailing of knitted arteries inserted into the body to the extreme scales of geotextiles, textiles are entering new fields of fabrication, hybridising existing technologies and inventing new ones. In architecture, the metaphor of textiles is increasingly informing design practice. Whereas textiles have always been used in tensile structures and within the interior, the idea of weaving, pleating or knitting a building is challenging traditional construction techniques. The idea of a curtain wall, an independent and self-supporting membrane of steel and glass that wraps around the building, is now being explored through the metaphor of fabric.
One of the key developments in this technological innovation has been the emergence of smart textiles, or intelligent textiles, that embed digital technology in woven, pleated or knitted surfaces. These materials enable wiring or circuitry to become a direct part of the material. Intelligent clothes, wearables and soft computing are research fields that have been receiving huge amounts of international interest during the last decade. The use of conductive threads and fabrics and the embroidery of standard electronic components as well as stand-alone microprocessors have allowed the imagining of a material that holds its own capacity for sensing and actuation. Here, state-changes: the intensification of colour, the emergence of light or the stirring of movement, allow the material itself to become a reactive surface that engages with its occupant or wearer. These materials have mostly had their application in the development of smart uniforms for the military, but have also lead to more experimental and probing explorations allowing for a new conditioning of technology as something soft, pliable, adaptive and mobile. Questioning the idea of a fixed user behind a standard terminal within a rigid office environment, these investigations propose a flexible technology that ultimately is ported and changed by its usage.
The International PhD Studentship will focus on the siting of these technologies within an architectural research context. Investigating the embedding of soft technology within the interior, the project will seek to define new means by which a dynamic and user-controlled architecture can be imagined. It is the intention that the candidate will work in a practice-based and experimental manner where direct experience and engagement with materials and technologies will create the foundation for innovative research.
If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed to receive the latest Architectradure’s articles in your reader or via email. Thanks for visiting!
The aim of Biojewellery is to strike up a range of relationships with an audience over the issues that surround biotechnology, tissue engineering in particular. The collaboration is between a core team of a bioengineer and two designers. By using an invasive medical procedure to procure cells the creators of Biojewellery are then manipulating these living organisms to produce designed objects.
Tissue engineering is one element of scientific study, which is beginning to have a profound effect on how disease and physical disorders are treated. What are the implications of medical research and how do we introduce the issues surrounding them? Creative responses perform a critical function in terms of challenging/raising public awareness, whilst engaging with the technologies themselves to create new methods of producing work. Biojewellery uses the device of a recognizable social custom to open a debate about new medical technology.
Posted by Cati Vaucelle @ Architectradure
If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed to receive the latest Architectradure’s articles in your reader or via email. Thanks for visiting!
Nendo designed the cabbage chair for XXIst Century Man exhibition curated by Issey Miyake to commemorate the first anniversary of 21_21 Design Sight in Roppongi, Tokyo.
Miyake asked the designers to make furniture out of the pleated paper that is produced in mass amounts during the process of making pleated fabric, and usually abandoned as an unwanted by-product. The designers’ solution to his challenge transformed a roll of pleated paper into a small chair that appears naturally as you peel away its outside layers, one layer at a time.
Resins added during the original paper production process adds strength and the ability to remember forms, and the pleats themselves give the chair elasticity and a springy resilience, for an overall effect that looks almost rough, but gives the user a soft, comfortable seating experience.
Photo by Masayuki Hayashi
Since the production process is so simple, the designers thought that eventually, the chair could be shipped as one compact roll for the user to cut open and peel back at home. The chair has no internal structure. It is not finished, and it is assembled without nails or screws. This primitive design responds gently to fabrication and distribution costs and environmental concerns, the kinds of issues that face our 21st century selves. Thus, the cabbage chair fits active, optimistic and forward-moving “21st century people”, the kind of people who, to borrow a concept Miyake expressed during a meeting with Nendo, “don’t just wear clothes, but shed their skin”.
Posted by Cati Vaucelle @ Architectradure
If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed to receive the latest Architectradure’s articles in your reader or via email. Thanks for visiting!
Nendo designed the cabbage chair for XXIst Century Man exhibition curated by Issey Miyake to commemorate the first anniversary of 21_21 Design Sight in Roppongi, Tokyo.
Miyake asked the designers to make furniture out of the pleated paper that is produced in mass amounts during the process of making pleated fabric, and usually abandoned as an unwanted by-product. The designers’ solution to his challenge transformed a roll of pleated paper into a small chair that appears naturally as you peel away its outside layers, one layer at a time.
Resins added during the original paper production process adds strength and the ability to remember forms, and the pleats themselves give the chair elasticity and a springy resilience, for an overall effect that looks almost rough, but gives the user a soft, comfortable seating experience.
Photo by Masayuki Hayashi
Since the production process is so simple, the designers thought that eventually, the chair could be shipped as one compact roll for the user to cut open and peel back at home. The chair has no internal structure. It is not finished, and it is assembled without nails or screws. This primitive design responds gently to fabrication and distribution costs and environmental concerns, the kinds of issues that face our 21st century selves. Thus, the cabbage chair fits active, optimistic and forward-moving “21st century people”, the kind of people who, to borrow a concept Miyake expressed during a meeting with Nendo, “don’t just wear clothes, but shed their skin”.
Posted by Cati Vaucelle @ Architectradure