“Worker, build your own machinery!” A workshop to practice the Technological Disobedience

This paper presents an account of the experience of a workshop with the title "Worker, build your own machinery!", held at Politecnico di Milano. The title of the workshop refers to an Ernesto Che Guevara’s quote in a 1961 speech: as the Republic of Cuba’s Minister of Industry, his aim was encouraging Cuban workers and technicians to face the scarcity of resources due to the country’s economic and political crisis. The general approach he suggested to address this issue was selfproduction of the spare parts required for productive activities: this would involve a number of strategies, such as repair, reuse and repurpose. Self-production included a drive towards the re-appropriation of technologies, suitably combining mass-production and handicraft tools. Over time, these practices became common not only in the field of industrial production, but also in everyday life. This workshop was directly inspired by the research work of Ernesto Oroza, designer and Cuban artist, who studied the changes that 50 years of isolation produced on the island’s materiality. The first part of the paper introduces and explains the theoretical concepts on which the workshop was based, whereas the second part exposes and discusses the resulting outcomes. This will include a reflection over the role of design and designers facing the deep social, economic and technological changes we are currently experiencing. These considerations will be aimed at encouraging future designers, emphasising the importance of their educational role and providing inspiration regarding issues, such as repair, reuse and repurpose, which are all essential for a sustainable approach

L’approccio della Fratelli Guzzini ai materiali

L’articolo si focalizza sull’esperienza di un’azienda italiana, la Guzzini, esempio storico ed autorevole del design italiano, che ha legato la sua storia e la sua immagine all’utilizzo di un materiale in particolare, il PMMA. Il fine dello studio è quello di svelare una storia inedita di ricerca materica che ha visto la sostituzione di un materiale naturale come il corno con un materiale sintetico, usandolo come “surrogato” di proprietà ingegneristiche e qualità espressivo-sensoriali, entrambe fondamentali per il progetto. Con riferimenti all’evoluzione del sistema produttivo si è cercato di evidenziare come l’azienda sia riuscita a valorizzare proprietà e qualità successivamente riconosciute come distintive del materiale sintetico

Correlation between intrinsic characteristics of industrial products and user's perception

The present study bases on the statement that the product experience is becoming a more and more important element in the user’s assessment and selection of an industrial product. This paper aims at investigating the existing correlation between form features of an industrial product and the user’s perception at the aesthetic level. The purpose of this study is to formalize a test able to return the connection existing between intrinsic features of a product and the user response in terms of meaning attribution

Emerging materials fostering interdisciplinary collaboration in Materials Design

Materials Design is a recognized emerging and growing area in design practice and research that converges different fields and approaches to addressing a holistic perspective of materials in and for design. Therefore, it incorporates knowledge from various disciplines, like engineering and science. Direct interdisciplinary collaboration between engineers, scientists, artists and designers can benefit projects whose purpose is to bring innovation regarding materials and design. We assume this interdisciplinarity is a crucial practice for developing the emerging field of Materials Design with a sustainable and circular perspective. This article conveys the findings of an empirical collection of case studies on emerging materials and product design. The results demonstrate the sustainability and circularity orientations they present and different disciplinary cooperation to generate innovative outcomes. The authors examined ten European enterprises that present products driven by emerging materials from alternative sources to support the statement. The paper identifies and reflects on the importance and value of collaboration. It aims to disseminate knowledge about the field of Materials Design and intends to highlight that interdisciplinary collaboration in this area can be favourable for achieving a sustainable paradigm and more responsible production and consumption patterns

Emerging materials for transition: A taxonomy proposal from a design perspective

In response to environmental challenges, design promotes emerging materials connected with the circular economy and environmental sustainability. However, there is confusion about their definition and contribution to sustainable design and production, showing a gap in their classification. This article proposes a taxonomy as a helpful tool to consolidate and unify terminology, definitions and general understanding of these emerging materials. An analysis of 31 real-world case studies helped outline the taxonomic proposal to formalise knowledge, fostering clarity in classifying and identifying them. The taxonomy aims to organise emerging materials, generate reflections, and encourage their responsible development, diffusion, and adoption

Bioreceptive interfaces for biophilic urban resilience

The emerging field of Biodesign sees living organisms as embedded in the design process to create bio-generated materials and artefacts. To support the growth and maintenance of these organisms, designers can adopt a Bioreceptive Design (BD) approach, recently defined as a design approach occurring every time materials or artefacts are intentionally designed to be colonized by life forms. Through this approach, the inert counterpart undergoes specific studies to reach the best bioreceptive potential for the designated life form, also considering the environment in which the artifact will be placed. In urban environments, BD examples tackle vegetation to create greener spaces and provide phytoremediation for better air quality and biodiversity in the built environment, in the wider view of nature-based solutions and climatic transitions of cities. This study addresses the possibility of developing bioreceptive interfaces for mosses and lichens to respond to biophilic and regenerative sustainability needs in urban contexts. These organisms have contributed as pioneers, during the evolution of life on our Planet, in the formation and regulation of soil and atmosphere; moreover, they are currently used in biomonitoring actions, also contributing to the environmental awareness of the built environment. The paper proposes BD as a design approach of mutual interest, aiming at responding to the host needs and preferable environmental conditions, serving multiple species that act as co-authors of an open-ended design, increasing urban biodiversity, and providing resilient, restorative, and regenerative environments. In particular, we present some of the results of an interdisciplinary research through design, born from the collaboration between design and biology, aiming both to bring sustainable and innovative solutions for the Biodesign and architecture sectors, but also to positively affect biological activities of biomonitoring and citizen awareness. From the design perspective, BD is applied for the selection of those material features that match the needs of the selected organism (e.g., porosity, color). Moreover, the use of Computational Design has played a crucial role in designing and prototyping bioinspired, organic shapes and textures. From a biological perspective, the research compares different methodologies for the bio-colonization of artefacts to obtain the best results for the timing and survival of the organisms. The prototypes were therefore exposed open-air with no protection or superficial treatments in a highly colonized area (from mosses and lichens), favoring the attachment of spores and propagules on the surfaces. On the other hand, some prototypes were used to test the transplant of the organisms as an alternative and faster possibility, also suitable for interior design. This study points out how BD can be applicable when designing for the living, making clear the designer’s possibilities for adopting this approach: ranging from material design to biomimicry, designing for not-only-human users, considering the host’s needs and preferable growth conditions, adopting a multispecies design approach while suggesting new relationships among biotic and abiotic agents. The paper highlights how BD can provide sustainable, low-maintenance, and regenerative nature-based solutions to foster resilient urban environments

Dynamism as an emerging materials experience for ICS Material

The world of contemporary materials presents a great variety of choice for material solutions. The materials, from passive entities to choose from, have become active elements that participate entirely in the design process, becoming objects of the project themselves. Starting from the shelves of the material library, where the samples are only closed and catalogued, the samples of the materials have gone on to be considered the main protagonists of the design process and the experimentation guided by design. Besides, the designers have shown that they want to be more and more independent in the design and prototyping of self-produced material solutions. They no longer want to depend totally on other professional figures such as engineers and chemists mainly, to get their hands-on and experiment with the materials. The phenomenon of self-production of materials by designers that have appeared in recent years has been formalized in the DIY-Materials approach which today leads to the development of original and innovative material solutions to which companies also look with interest (Rognoli et al., 2015). The materiality of the world where we live is changing under the influence of technological advancement and social requirements. The diffusion of the Open source and the spreading of fab labs, workshops, and platforms for experimentation and prototyping, the democratization of technological practices is conducting to easier access to data and technologies both owned, through cheap and flexible tools, and shared, also for non-specialized users. As a result, the design is becoming computational and interactive, exploring trans-disciplinary approaches, and merging with computer engineering and biology (Parisi et al., 2018)

Alessandra Sisti, Deoshree Bendre, MyHelmet, Organs, 2021

Two projects from the Milan Polytechnic School of Design mark an important step toward the use of bio-produced mycelium on an industrial scal

L'atlante espressivo-sensoriale dei materiali

L’importanza dell’interazione sensoriale che si instaura tra utente e prodotto è oggi riscoperta e studiata. Per questa ragione, nell’ambito progettuale si può trovare un fiorente ramo di ricerche orientate ad indagare i meccanismi percettivi e le leve sensoriali utili allo scaturire di effetti coerenti e a volte sorprendenti. I materiali giocano un ruolo di primo piano nelle dinamiche sensoriali. I prodotti, composti in primo luogo da i materiali che ne determinano la forma, per essere usati vengono toccati, manipolati, guardati, studiati, tutte azioni che coinvolgono principalmente le sfere percettive del contatto e della visione. Ciò che si vuole in questa sede ribadire è che l’aspetto fenomenologico dei materiali dei prodotti che ci circondano, non è frutto della casualità, ma può e deve essere progettato

L'estasi dell'artificiale

L’informazione veicolata dalla materia è uno dei canali con cui si determina sematicamente il messaggio degli oggetti. Essendo oggi arrivati ad una tecnologia di produzione estremamente complessa, sembra irrimediabilmente perduta la genuinità dei materiali. “ Ma che cosa è la genuinità dei materiali? Dove sono i confini che separano la genuinità dalla non-genuinità? O più concretamente: fino a quando un materiale storico – metallo, legno, pietra, marmo, gomma natuarale, argilla – può essere considerato natuale e a partire da quando artificiale? Quali sono i parametri di giudizio in proposito? E’ un tema particolarmente ostico”. (Maldonado T., Reale e Virtuale, Feltrinelli, Milano, 1992, p.82