Architec Tradure

Category: project and technology.

  • 12JanTaptap, the affectionate scarf

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    TapTap: A Haptic Wearable for Asynchronous Distributed Touch Therapy

    I continued the development on my conceptual idea touching memories and as a team we came up with a final prototype called ‘taptap’.

    TapTap is a wearable haptic system that allows nurturing human touch to be recorded, broadcast and played back for emotional therapy. Haptic input/output modules in a convenient modular scarf provide affectionate touch that can be personalized.

    Movie of Taptap


    This picture shows the second prototype that is a scarf with large pockets with a power supply. The design of the scarf is intended to make it wearable in a number of ways and allow specific TapTap actuators to be mounted wherever the wearer desires. The outside of the scarf is a public color (gray) while the inside and its intimate actuators are a warm color (pink).

    Based on haptic devices, taptap can be re-configured to record and play back the touch that is most meaningful to each user. It is made from felt in two layers: one grey one that faces the public and a pink layer that touches you and contains the haptic modules in specially designed pockets. Taptap can be worn as a regular scarf, and custom touch modules can be placed in powered pockets within to record and play back touch where and when you want it

    Taptap was blogged by Regine Debatty on we-make-money-not-art.com with a nice summary and useful references 🙂

    Taptap is a team and class project for the Tangible Media class final assignment at MIT Media Lab taught by Dr Hiroshi Ishii. I presented with Leo at CHi’06 as an extended Abstract of Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI ‘06), (Montreal, Quebec, Canada. April 22-27, 2006) by Bonanni, L., Lieberman, J., Vaucelle, C., Zuckerman, O. (alphabetical order). Download pdf.

    Taptap was part of the second Seamless fashion show, on February 1, at the Boston Museum of Science.

    On this picture, I wear a second prototype

    A few publications on Taptap and its next steps:
    . A Framework for Haptic Psycho-Therapy Published in the Proceedings of IEEE ICPS Pervasive Health Systems Workshop, Lyon, France, 2006.
    . Affective TouchCasting Published in the Proceedings of SIGGRAPH’06, Boston, USA. Abstract from publisher: ACM Press. Download pdf

  • 20JanThe Breathing Wall

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    The Breathing Wall is a Kinetic Installation that shows a wall reacting to the public space. Made out of architectural objects that work independently or dependently of one another, it deploys and retracts soft fabric

    This picture shows the mechanics and electronics of our Breathing Wall piece.

    On this picture I create shadows on the light sensors to have the Breathing Wall react to my presence.

    During our conceptual phase, we thought of an assembly of cloth cubes that would form partial transparency. When densely packed, they form a privacy cloud or mist enclosure. When they retract they close the view they were enhancing. The idea is to use these kind of elements to define more diffuse borders in architecture. Soft edges resembling the spatial limits one finds in nature and in the landscape.

    Our concept



    Inspiring research

    We would like to think of it on a scale of a huge wall, where the experience an outsider has of the activities going on inside is shifting constantly by the affordances of the changing architectural surface.

    Process of implementation

    First round







    Second round





    I have created this kinetic piece with Ana Aleman. It is our final assignment for the Kinetic Architecture class taught by Dr Kostas Terzidis.

    Review process summary

    For the first assignment of this class I had designed a Memento Box as an attractive passage from door to space. The door leads to your souvenirs and is always slightly opened. A bright light shines in the back of the box clarifying a few objects and pictures around it. However, whenever your hand tries to grab what captures the eye, the door closes onto your hand in front of you and all is dark again. Whenever you go away for a tiny bit, the door opens up and more lights shine into some parts of your souvenirs and you can travel though them from far away …



    Picture of the Memento Box

    For the second assignment of this class I had designed the Ambient Peacock/Chameleon explorer with Philip Vriend as a serie of mobile units connected to a headquarter that display environmental visual on each of their shell. Real time connecting to the headquarter allow the head to ask for specific data gathering and collection of the environment. This project was blogged by Pasta and Vinegar.



    Picture of the ‘air’ mobile unit

    By Cati in kinetic architecture


  • 20JanThe Breathing Wall

    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 Breathing Wall is a Kinetic Installation that shows a wall reacting to the public space. Made out of architectural objects that work independently or dependently of one another, it deploys and retracts soft fabric

    This picture shows the mechanics and electronics of our Breathing Wall piece.

    On this picture I create shadows on the light sensors to have the Breathing Wall react to my presence.

    During our conceptual phase, we thought of an assembly of cloth cubes that would form partial transparency. When densely packed, they form a privacy cloud or mist enclosure. When they retract they close the view they were enhancing. The idea is to use these kind of elements to define more diffuse borders in architecture. Soft edges resembling the spatial limits one finds in nature and in the landscape.

    Our concept


    Inspiring research

    We would like to think of it on a scale of a huge wall, where the experience an outsider has of the activities going on inside is shifting constantly by the affordances of the changing architectural surface.

    Process of implementation
    First round



    Second round


    I have created this kinetic piece with Ana Aleman. It is our final assignment for the Kinetic Architecture class taught by Dr Kostas Terzidis.

    Review process summary

    For the first assignment of this class I had designed a Memento Box as an attractive passage from door to space. The door leads to your souvenirs and is always slightly opened. A bright light shines in the back of the box clarifying a few objects and pictures around it. However, whenever your hand tries to grab what captures the eye, the door closes onto your hand in front of you and all is dark again. Whenever you go away for a tiny bit, the door opens up and more lights shine into some parts of your souvenirs and you can travel though them from far away …


    Picture of the Memento Box

    For the second assignment of this class I had designed the Ambient Peacock/Chameleon explorer with Philip Vriend as a serie of mobile units connected to a headquarter that display environmental visual on each of their shell. Real time connecting to the headquarter allow the head to ask for specific data gathering and collection of the environment. This project was blogged by Pasta and Vinegar.


    Picture of the ‘air’ mobile unit

    By Cati in kinetic architecture

  • 10AprProcessing point of view

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    I have tried processing by entering a few lines of script into the processing window.

    processing en essais

    For instance I wrote the following script:

    size(600, 600);

    background(50,50,50);

    for(int x=0; x 128){

    stroke(r, g, b);

    rect(r,g, 1, 8);

    }

    else{

    stroke(50,0,0);

    rect(x,y, 10, 91);

    }

    }

    }

    and processing has generated the following graphic:





    Rendez-vous creation     has selected a few images I made with processing.

    In digital graphics


  • 24FebInteraction Design and Children

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    Jabberstamp? It is for adults to understand that a work of art is not a hat, but a boa digesting an elephant! – Yasmine Abbas

    I teamed with Hayes Raffle to work on his Jabberstamp invention.

    This is the first time I work on a project on which I am not the inventor. This collaboration is refreshing through the distance allowed by not being the actual initiator. It brings critical insights on the interaction design. Hayes asked me to join him, because of my background in toy design for children, especially the design of toys for emergent literacy. Out of the technology available, I tried to understand what could children do with the simple mechanism of associating sounds to drawings. Hayes and I end up testing the system, improving elements of the design and discussing its contribution. A pilot evaluation with children confirmed our hypothesis about the type of narrative children explore with such technological system.

    We submitted a video for Siggraph’07, educator program and Jabberstamp was elected for being demoed and exhibited during the conference, the 5-9 of August 2007, San Diego, California.

    A full paper Hayes and I wrote together on Jabberstamp got accepted to the Interaction Design and Children conference. The focus of the conference is on children’s role in the design and evaluation of interactive technologies. So we hope to see you in June 6-8, 2007, Aalborg in Denmark!

    Abstract We introduce Jabberstamp, the first tool that allows children to synthesize their drawings and voices. To use Jabberstamp, children create drawings, collages or paintings on normal paper. They press a special rubber stamp onto the page to record sounds into their drawings. When children touch the marks of the stamp with a small trumpet, they can hear the sounds playback, retelling the stories they have created. We describe our design process and analyze the mechanism between the act of drawing and the one of telling, defining interdependencies between the two activities. In a series of studies, children ages 4-8 use Jabberstamp to convey meaning in their drawings. The system allows collaboration among peers at different developmental levels. Jabberstamp compositions reveal children’s narrative styles and their planning strategies. In guided activities, children develop stories by situating sound recording in their drawing, which suggests future opportunities for hybrid voice–visual tools to support children’s emergent literacy.

    Jabberstamp is a MIT Media Lab project developed in the Tangible Media Group with Dr Hiroshi Ishii.

    News (update)
    July 23 07 Digital inspiration by Amit Agarwal.
    July 23 07 Article in Discovery Channel by Tracy Staedter.
    June 29 07 Article in Digital experience by Jonas Petersen.

    Previous post on Jabberstamp.


    IDC logo

  • 16NovOpen Studio by MIT Media Lab

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    Open Studio is a new experimental online art exchange system developed at the MIT Media Lab. I find it very promising, so check it out!

    So yesterday night, I have started to look at it, and made a few drawings with their system, it looks as if I was painting with my feet, but the constraint in design is what makes it very interesting to me.



    La Petite Tuture Rose that I have sold in 2 minutes to Burak Arikan 😀



    Le feu s’etiole that has been bought by Brent Fitzgerald today!



    And … Les mots doux, sold to Francis in 5 minutes last night !!!There are cool ideas on this Studio and such a great tool to experiment with. By trying it out, and exchanging art work, I have found that it raises questions about the value of virtual art, especially the recognition in a virtual community.

    Finally, ‘douceur’ my last drawing with the system …

    By Cati in digital drawing


  • 16NovOpen Studio by MIT Media Lab

    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!

    Open Studio is a new experimental online art exchange system developed at the MIT Media Lab. I find it very promising, so check it out!

    So yesterday night, I have started to look at it, and made a few drawings with their system, it looks as if I was painting with my feet, but the constraint in design is what makes it very interesting to me.



    La Petite Tuture Rose that I have sold in 2 minutes to Burak Arikan 😀



    Le feu s’etiole that has been bought by Brent Fitzgerald today!



    And … Les mots doux, sold to Francis in 5 minutes last night !!!There are cool ideas on this Studio and such a great tool to experiment with. By trying it out, and exchanging art work, I have found that it raises questions about the value of virtual art, especially the recognition in a virtual community.

    Finally, ‘douceur’ my last drawing with the system …

    By Cati in digital drawing