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Leading Bio-design Studio using computational methods/production techniques

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Envision a future of complete synergy between Nature and humanity. OXMAN is accelerating systems-level change by fusing design, technology, and biology in a radical shift from human-centric design to Nature-centric design.

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Very Cool Drawing Machines

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Jürg Lehni works collaboratively across disciplines, dealing with the nuances between technology, tools and the human condition.

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Mycelium 3D-Print Studio

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Design with re-use and Natural Materials Using Computational Methods

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Applying Living Systems to Design Practices

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Carole Collet – Adopting a living systems approach to design as an inquiry into regenerative futures

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Using robotics to craft plastics into furniture

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The New Raw - crafting plastic waste with robots

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Systems Furniture Design

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My fascination with the digital era really took off when I saw an animation in a documentary about German Professor Claus Mattheck. To me this was not just an animation of an optimized engine mount, but a visualization of how the industrial era in general is transforming into the digital era. Industrial times and modernist pioneers were all about assembly and standardized parts in a geometric form language dictated by the limitations of industrial machines. In our digital era, however, we are no longer bound by these limitations. With digital design and fabrication tools we can create smarter customized forms that are much more complex. But it is also true that throughout design history, designers have striven to make objects inspired by nature: from Art Nouveau, driven by innovations in materials like cast iron, to Streamline, driven by innovations in materials like aluminum, and the organic design of the 1960s, driven by innovations in plastics and plywood. But our digital age makes it possible to not just use nature as a stylistic reference, but to actually use the underlying principles to generate shapes just like an evolutionary process.

While trees have the ability to add material where strength is needed, bones have the ability to take away material where it is not. With this knowledge, German engineer Professor Lothar Harzheim, together with the International Development Centre Adam Opel GmbH, developed a dynamic digital tool that copies these ways of constructing, and used it to optimize car parts. This software mimics quite precisely the way evolution constructs. For me, this opened up an entire world of possibilities that we can only begin to imagine.

The design of the Bone Chair actually began back in 1998, when Adam Opel GmbH, a German General Motors subsidiary, developed new imaging and simulation software with the intention to create a more efficient engine mount. The purpose of the engine mount design software was to fix specific elements in place while providing optimum strength, using a minimum of materials. This is done by creating a virtual three-dimensional model and simulating the application of stress to specific points on the design. Then the algorithm takes away all of the material that isn't necessarily needed, without weakening the part. What most amazed me about this process is that it uses the very same principle that evolution does in living organisms. Bones in particular are highly efficient in growing internal structures to achieve an optimal weight-strength ratio as they constantly add and remove material in response to stresses from their environment. The software designed by Adam Opel GmbH replicates the same process: repeated generations of the simulation add material where strength is needed, and chip away material everywhere it is not, creating a design that achieves maximum strength with a minimum amount of material. When I was asked to participate in the Smart Deco exhibition initiated by Droog and Barry Friedman, my proposal was to create an entire chair by using this algorithm as a high-tech digital sculpting tool. If Mother Nature wanted to create a chair, it would probably look something like the results we would get.

For the aluminum Bone Chair, the computer-generated result had to be refined for the specifications of aluminum. This resulted in a much more slender shape. We did face yet another challenge, however, for it wasn't going to be easy to produce such a complex organic shape. Especially because assembling it from cast components would leave visible welding stains. Preferably, it would have to be cast in one piece in such a way that no bubbles would show on the surface. Virtually every company we approached refused to take up the challenge, until we appealed to Phil Verdult, who had a small workshop somewhere in the small town of Heerhugowaard. Phil had years of experience with casting processes and had conducted many experiments with new techniques in his workshop, for instance with casting metal in 3D printed ceramic molds. The complex mold could be assembled from such mold parts, and the actual object cast in one go. This resulted in the first aluminum Bone Chair.

The Bone Chaise is part of the permanent collection of the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, Museum of Modern Art, New York, Vitra Design Museum, Weil am Rhein, Centraal Museum, Utrecht, Museum fur Kunst und Gewerbe, Hamburg.

(photocredit: Daniel Nicolas, CAB Burgos, JL)

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My fascination with the digital era really took off when I saw an animation in a documentary about German Professor Claus Mattheck. To me this was not just an animation of an optimized engine mount, but a visualization of how the industrial era in general is transforming into the digital era.

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Citizen Sense is delighted to launch AirKit, a toolkit to support citizens in monitoring air quality. AirKit has been developed through nearly two years of building, testing, and installing air...

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Citizen Sense is delighted to launch AirKit, a toolkit to support citizens in monitoring air quality. AirKit has been developed through nearly two years of building, testing, and installing air...

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Kinetic & Sensory Projects

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Kinetic & Sensory Artist

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David Bowen kinetic, robotic, interactive and data driven sculpture

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Media Art Net | Goldberg, Ken: TeleGarden

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A robot as gardener, a flower bed as international meeting place in the World Wide Web. You can control a robotic arm via WWW in order to observe and tend the garden. Sow and water the plants, or simply get together in the Chat Channel with other telegardeners from all over the world.
The «TeleGarden»is an art installation that allows WWW users to view and interact with a remote garden filled with living plants. Members can plant, water, and monitor the progress of seedlings via the tender movements of an industrial robot arm.

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Nik Ramage, sculptor of useless and absurd machines.

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kinetic artist

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Welcome back to Instagram. Sign in to check out what your friends, family & interests have been capturing & sharing around the world.

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Join an international education program for high school and college students that introduces the intersection of biotechnology, art, and design and connects you to a global network of leaders in academia, industry, and entrepreneurship who are defining the field of biodesign. Help us pioneer, envision, create, and critique transformational applications in biotech.

Finalists from schools across the globe gather in New York City at the Museum of Modern Art and Parsons School of Design to showcase their projects before leading thinkers in academia, industry, art, and design, and 400+ audience members. Teams compete for prizes, including the coveted grand prize-the Glass Microbe.

Selected from hundreds of artworks and designs from BDC, our first book is a compilation of projects and ideas that are influencing the emerging field of biodesign. In their own words, pioneers and BDC alumni explore the future of biodesign and its role in shaping people's identities, cultures, and relationships with the living environment. Beyond being a primer, the book is a celebration of the first five years of our program and a deep dive into the minds behind biodesign.

BDC alumni have gone on to become biodesign instructors themselves, turn their projects into startups, and exhibit in public forums. Former students have raised over $30 million in investment for their startup companies, while others have exhibited their projects at venues including the United Nations, the World Economic Forum, MIT Museum, the London Design Festival, the Gregg Museum, Rhode Island School of Design, and elsewhere.

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The Biodesign Challenge offers art and design students the opportunity to envision future applications of biotechnology.

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Home to research and projects on all types of materials

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Recent additions

The Future Materials Bank is an archive of materials that supports and promotes the transition towards ecologically conscious art and design practices. It is part of Future Materials, an initiative of the Nature Research department at the Jan van Eyck Academie.

Contact us at futurematerialsbank@janvaneyck.nl.

Follow @futurematerialsbank on Instagram.

Logo by Oliver Klimpel.

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Materials that support the transition towards a more sustainable artistic practice

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Fusion 360 User Interface Tutorial | 2024 Interface

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Browse thousands of projects created by the Arduino community