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Thursday 5 November 2020

"Architecture should create possibilities for interaction" says Studio INI founder Nassia Inglessis

In the third video of our Design for Life collaboration with Dassault Systèmes, Studio INI founder Nassia Inglessis describes how technology enables her to create interactive spaces.

Inglessis is the second designer to feature in the Design for Life collaboration between Dezeen and Dassault Systèmes, which highlights designers who are using technology and research to build a better world.

The Greek engineer and designer is the founder of Studio INI, an experimental design practice based between London and Athens, and winner of the Dezeen Awards 2020 public vote for designer of the year.

Urban Imprint by Studio INI — Urban Imprint was an installation designed by experimental design practice Studio INI

"Studio INI couples rigorous scientific and design research in order to create immersive experiential environments," explains Inglessis in the video, which was filmed by Dezeen at her studio at Somerset House in London.

The practice is known for creating intricate architectural installations that respond to the bodies of visitors.

Urban Imprint, an installation designed by Studio INI that appeared last year at A/D/O in Brooklyn, featured a canopy that opens up around visitors' heads in reaction to the weight of their footsteps.

The installation was a reaction to the rigidity of urban space as experienced by humans, in contrast to natural environments which, according to Inglessis, react to the presence of humans.

"Urban Imprint was a way of completely reimagining an urban landscape to be closer to how we experience a space in nature," she explained.

"It's a malleable, flexible environment that basically would construct around its inhabitants."

As a visitor steps into the installation, a flexible floor depresses around their foot, triggering a system of pulleys that tighten and lift the roof into a dome shape above the inhabitant's head.

The process of designing the installation involved reconfiguring materials often used in construction to make them flexible and reactive.

"We took all the materials that are in an urban environment - cement, rubber steel - and had to find a way to make them expand and return," said Inglessis.

At London Design Biennale in 2018, Studio INI represented Greece with an installation named Disobedience situated in the courtyard of Somerset House.

Disobedience by Studio INI — Studio INI designed Disobedience for the London Design Biennale in 2018. Photograph by Ed Reeve

"Disobedience is a 17-metre kinetic wall that you can walk through," said Inglessis.

Visitors were invited to walk along a platform flanked by flexible walls that bulge open around them as they pass through the installation.

"It's a spring made out of steel, which basically flexes open in response to the weight of your step," the designer explained.

Studio INI's process involves a combination of complex engineering using design tools, hands-on material experimentation and user research.

"Rapid prototyping and digital fabrication allows us to very quickly go from the digital to the physical, and also allows us the precision to try really complex designs," said Inglessis.

"We always have one hand on the computer and one hand on the material. It's a dialogue back and forth."

This process allows the designer to realise environments that exemplify the principle that people should be able to interact with the spaces they occupy.

"Architecture shouldn't create limits or borders, but it should really create possibilities for exchange and for interaction," the designer stated.

Photography is by Luke A Walker except where stated.

Design for Life

Design For Life is a content collaboration between Dezeen and Dassault Systèmes featuring talks, videos and workshops highlighting designers who are using technology and research to build a better world.

The collaboration kicked off with a live talk with architect Arthur Mamou-Mani and Dassault Systèmes’ vice president of design experience Anne Asensio.

The talk was followed by a video profiling Austrian designer Julia Koerner, in which she shows how she uses technology to apply architectural techniques to fashion and costume design.

In the next instalment of the series, Exploration Architecture founder Michael Pawlyn explained how biomimicry allows architects to have a positive impact on the environment.

In the coming weeks, we will be broadcasting a live workshop with Mamou-Mani, as well as publishing a series of videos profiling the work of cutting-edge architects and designers including DS Automobiles design director Thierry Metroz and New York design duo Birsel+Seck.

The post "Architecture should create possibilities for interaction" says Studio INI founder Nassia Inglessis appeared first on Dezeen.

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The Help Portfolio sells prints by Margaret Calvert, Yinka Shonibare and Michael Craig-Martin to fundraise for Covid charities

Calvert also designed the Help logo and portfolio box, featuring 16 eclectic artworks that reflect our current time.

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Meet our creatively curious Extra Nice mascot, created and brought to life by Animade

You may have spotted a cheerful, cheeky and creatively inquisitive new character gracing It’s Nice That over the past week. Here’s how we developed this embodiment of Extra Nice in collaboration with Animade.

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Join the Art Directors Club of Europe for a creative festival this weekend

Taking place this Friday and Saturday, the ADCE Festival will be diving into “Prototyping brands for a new era” via a series of talks and workshops.

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Max Lamb creates sculptural furniture pieces from 3D-tiles

Close-up of Tajimi Custom Tiles by Max Lamb

London designer Max Lamb has created an installation of sculptural items made from 3D-shaped tiles he developed for Japanese brand Tajimi Custom Tiles.

Tajimi Custom Tiles worked with Lamb to create the tiles, which can be custom made for architects, and an installation of pieces made from them that was displayed in Tokyo.

Lamb decided to produce his tiles using the pressure moulding, which creates highly precise shapes, so he could play with the idea of making the seemingly two-dimensional tiles more three-dimensional.

Three-dimensional tiles by Max Lamb — Lamb wanted to create three-dimensional tiles

"Tiles are always used in the third dimension – even though they're seemingly superficial, like a flat surface on a floor," Lamb told Dezeen.

"But the object that they're being used on is three-dimensional. And so I thought: what if my tile is two-dimensional, but can wrap up onto the wall?" he added.

"Suddenly there's a change of direction. I was focusing on those changes – how do I transition between a plane on the x-axis first, onto a plane on the y-axis?"

Max Lamb's tiles at exhibition in Tokyo — The tiles were created to launch Tajimi CustomTiles

To create his tiles, Lamb used closed moulds – a production process similar to plastic moulding where moulds are injected with a semi-liquid clay paste.

He came up with four different tile designs – a flat tile, a corner tile, a curved bead tile and a sweep tile that can be used where a floor connects to a wall.

"The flat tile is only glazed on one side, but the three shaped tiles can be glazed on either side and mounted in both directions," the designer explained.

Tiled sculpture by Max Lamb for Tajimi Custom Tiles — They come in four different shapes

The tiles were originally produced for an exhibition to launch Tajimi Custom Tiles, which was held in Tokyo from October 31 to November 3.

Lamb created a number of sculptural tile designs for the event, including pieces that look like seats, a bowl and a large cushion with rounded corners.

"Although the tiles themselves are products in their own right, I wanted the pieces that I designed to be objects in their own right as well," he said.

"I see them as mini pieces of architecture. They are furniture. They are three-dimensional, with three-dimensional tiles that connect the different flat planes."

View of Max Lamb's sculptures for Tajimi Custom Tiles — A factory visit informed Lamb's sculptural tile designs

While these initial designs were a way to play with the preconceived notions of how tiles are used and create playful shapes, the tiles also have a practical application. So far, Lamb has used them in his own bathroom as well as for the bathroom of art gallery Salon 94 in New York.

"I'm having a lot of fun designing bathrooms using those tiles as a building block, wrapping the floor, the walls, the basin, the shelf, and little niches within the room that offer platforms for soap dispensers and paper towels [in tiles]," Lamb said.

Tajimi Custom Tiles will make bespoke tiles for architects and designers and is based in Tajimi in the centre of Japan's tile industry. Lamb's designs were informed by a visit to its factory, where he saw the production process in action.

"What I find so beautiful about working in Japan is that it doesn't matter where you go – every single place, every single town, city or prefecture has its own very distinct craft or industry," Lamb said.

"You literally could spend a lifetime exploring Japan through crafted design and making."

Kwangho Lee Tajimi Custom Tile sculptures — Lee's looped designs for Tajimi Custom Tiles

The exhibition in Toyko also featured tiles designed created by Korean designer Kwangho Lee. Lee was inspired by the clay extrusion process and created modules that can be aligned to create patterns that seem knitted together.

Other innovative designs using tiles include design studio Alva's tables with tiled cut-outs that look like swimming pools and Adam Nathaniel Furman's "flowerburst" mosaic design for a London maternity centre.

Tajimi Custom Tiles Tokyo 2020 Installations by Max Lamb and Kwangho Lee in 3D was on from October 31 to November 3. See Dezeen Events Guide for an up-to-date list of architecture and design events taking place around the world.

The post Max Lamb creates sculptural furniture pieces from 3D-tiles appeared first on Dezeen.

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