I am fascinated by ready-made products, flat-pack furniture, and the re-use or re-utilisation of products or materials from their intended purpose, in other functions, or as stock to produce new things from re-newed material. Circular material streams, or at least closed-loop material streams is an interesting developing field. I think this system will become the base of production, whereby the goal that every 'thing' is 're-used' in some capacity will be reached. The preventative barrier against this trajectory is in my view the availability and relative costs of producing or mining new materials than re-extracting or re-deploying materials from other spaces or situations.
Metals on the whole can be melted down and reformed endlessly, and the same is true to an extent with polymer-chain plastics. Paper, cardboard, and wood can be pulped and reformed also. Although there is a downward trend of materials towards genericness through an entropic descent. You can't make a tree from paper for example.
This view has informed my design journey for a long time, and the development of the idea that a radical shift in the sourcing of materials for the production process will be the paradigm altering step in the present 'Revolution of Design'.
Metals on the whole can be melted down and reformed endlessly, and the same is true to an extent with polymer-chain plastics. Paper, cardboard, and wood can be pulped and reformed also. Although there is a downward trend of materials towards genericness through an entropic descent. You can't make a tree from paper for example.
This view has informed my design journey for a long time, and the development of the idea that a radical shift in the sourcing of materials for the production process will be the paradigm altering step in the present 'Revolution of Design'.
Designing Dope
Designing Dope was the first dissertation I wrote, it is on the paradigm shifting potential of novel materials, especially of those that can be grown. This dissertation is focussed on Cannabis, and related Hemp products, their history, and relationship to the present.
We live in a world abundantly filled with designed objects, they come to be in many ways; formed, deformed, and reformed. For thousands of years, people have imagined, created, and executed a design specifications to produce objects for specific uses. These objects do not just exist by themselves, they come to be via complex processes, and systems; planned, and executed with intent.
The eternal convergence and divergence of the streams and strains of design ideas and ideals fundamentally shapes the way in which, as inhabitants, we see the world. “With the dawn of the industrial era the world became a place of continuous, ever-accelerating change” (Carson, R. 1962). Our change rarely has much sight of the future, and so “instead of the natural environment there was rapidly substituted an artificial one composed of new chemical and physical agents, many of them possessing powerful capacities for inducing biologic change” (Ibid. p115).
The eternal convergence and divergence of the streams and strains of design ideas and ideals fundamentally shapes the way in which, as inhabitants, we see the world. “With the dawn of the industrial era the world became a place of continuous, ever-accelerating change” (Carson, R. 1962). Our change rarely has much sight of the future, and so “instead of the natural environment there was rapidly substituted an artificial one composed of new chemical and physical agents, many of them possessing powerful capacities for inducing biologic change” (Ibid. p115).
Desiging Dope: Producing from the Natural, the Artificial (Link to PDF in image)
Introduction
The story of human history is littered with artefacts rendered for specific functions by people much like ourselves [Fig. 2]. Human reliance on nature is indisputable. The natural world includes everything from the vast expanse of outer space to everything that has ever been or anything that ever will be. Dividing the production of human labour by labelling and categorising things as artificial in their nature serves to make the human entity separate to the natural system. We have classifications for things beyond our capacity to naturally observe them, for example DNA helices, genetic sequences, or even just the past... (read more)
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How do people keep the tools they own?
Design proposition poster for final year studio project.
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Liminal Design
The second dissertation I wrote was on Liminal Design and the relevance of ideas presented in *'The Structure of Scientific Revolutions' by Thomas Kuhn, aligning his ideas about the progression of scientific study to the progression of technological development and the Product Design done around it.
Synopsis
This dissertation seeks to understand the relationship of Kuhn’s theory of the structure of scientific revolutions relationships to the field of design. It looks initially at the history of manufacture through the development of the Watt steam engine, Wilkinson’s cannon boring method, and the Bramah Lock. It continues into the present through a discussion on the integration of software into physical products, and what that means both for the users and manufacturers of these objects. It considers the impact of the modern space race on society and considers the psychological and societal impacts on a changing paradigm by looking initially at the SpaceX Raptor Engine, and the Blue-Origin New Shephard and Blue Moon vehicles. It compares the systematic methodologies of these two companies, and concludes by discussing the integration of these systems, and the way in which a future within a multi-planetary civilisation could technologically come to be.
Introduction
This dissertation will examine Kuhn’s concept of paradigm shifts as scientific revolutions, alongside the concept of liminality as the pre-paradigm period, or ‘pre-liminal’, and how these paradigm shifting revolutions affects the psychological framework of the paradigm. To do this I will begin by looking at the situation which led to the ultimate production of the Watt steam engine, and how varying technologies were combined together to make a significantly more efficient and powerful version of existing machines. Looking at how technical developments can lead to societal paradigm shifts....(read more)
A Moment for Liminal Design: Scientific Design, and the Pre-Liminal Space Preceeding a Paradigm Shift (Link to PDF in image)
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I have a Cent page, where I uploaded an article on NFTs, attempting to explain them to an audience unknowing. This blog should hopefully allow me to collect my thoughts on design, products, and the space in which those objects exist; together into a more organised selection.
Theories on Thinking about Design
Theories on Thinking about Design was an experiment in writing from within a postmodern/poststructural frame, I started working on it after a throwaway comment by a lecturer about designers and reading. In the end I am pleased with it, even if it actually says very little in a large number of words. In part an attempt to understand some of the elements and ideas presented in A Thousand Plateaus.
Introduction
“It was a lovely spring morning - may 22nd, to be exact - when we made that fateful journey which brought me on to a stage which is destined to be historical.” (Conan Doyle 1995: 446-447)
a précis of activities and experiences - an adventure map of some kind?
A plateau, a middle, not at the beginning or the end. The same Professor Challenger who gave a lecture to quite a crowd, in the mind of Two Among Several. There explained the body without organs within and without, he leads a discussion through the strata of the Earth and the history with a Geology of Morality. So as to situate a quote from an earlier conversation,... (read more)
