Design:
Natassa Lianou, Ermis Chalvatzis, Luis Costa, Michael Rogers

Status:
Design and Material Research

Exhibited:
London Festival of Architecture 2010, London, UK

Year:
2009

The objective of this research project, is to create transformable units, based on material and pattern exploration. The Bloom project, is based on the experimentation of the lycra combining it with piano wires. The transformations are controlled from the material and the patterns that we ʼweaveʼ into the fabric. The variety of the patterns as well as the thickness of the wire, the redundancy of the internal/passive loops or the controllable/movable loops and the scale of the whole unit, are fundamental parameters of the function of the system, as well as of its local and global transformations. During the bloom process, we explore the global and the local behavior of the material, while we inform and evolve our scripted patterns and vise versa. The transformations of the model are stimulated from the movement (from the pushing and the pulling), of the wires. According to the wires that the users choose to pull or push, the deformation of the system is different. The system opens and closes, like a flower that blooms. Thus, the workflow of this research consists a feedback loop, where the material tests gives as feedback which inform our computational exploration and thus we update and evolve our code based patterns, which then are transferred and applied into the material, in order to receive new data.

Finally, by adding flex and light sensors, Bloom reacts entirely to the light level of its environment: higher levels cause it to open while lower levels induce it to close. The magnitude of the light levels translates into the speed of the motors, making passing clouds or spectatorʼs shadows noticeably apparent. During this phase Bloom operates is through the helio-centric principals of a flower but with time the other three factors of the equation begin to transform this direct interaction with the sun and create an increasingly emergent set of behavior in which Bloom reacts as much to itself as it does its
surroundings.