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9. Textile as scaffold

Crystallisation

Copper

final

final

Crystallisation

320 g Copper
420 ml drinking purified water

Method:

* Started by cleaning the tools
* in a hot bath I heated the water without reaching boiling temperature
* measured my alum and add it and stirred
* kept adding until I could feel the copper residue at the bottom of the jar
* filtered the mixture through cotton sheet in a jar
* added the residue in a plate
* powered some mixture in a plate for individual crystals
* added my fabric and items to crystallise in the main jar
* everything started crystalizing a lot in a couple of hours however I left everything untouched for 5 days

copper process 3

final

final

Alum

alum

First recipe:
55 g Alum
300 ml water

Second recipe:
180 g Alum
300 ml water

Result : Unfortunately, both recipes didn't work in creating crystals. My hypothesis is either the copper fabric reacted to the alum or the mixture could have been saturated more.

CNC milling

My journey keeps taking me back to water and oceans. This time I was intrigued to make something that reflects how water behaves. A sophisticated construction of movement that looks so random and effortless. The idea of a solid material resembling water caught my interest. Therefore I tried to construct this movement into a mold to try with leather and biomaterials I have made before.

water movement inspirations

Bubbles

I worked on a fully parametric design for which you can change all parameters to bubbles rhino

bubbles grasshopper

In this video you can see some of the changes that can be made to it for different results and variations.

Subtle Waves

waves 3d

I chose to make a parametric design using grasshopper and rhino so I can implement it on any curve and adjust it for any future projects.

waves rhino

waves rhino

In this video you can see some of the changes that can be made to it for different results and variations.

And here is the grasshopper file in a picture. As you can see both the female and male molds can be baked directly.

waves grasshopper

You can download the fileS here:

Now it's time for the CNC milling machine which will be done by the end of the course.

Wood Textile

Researching wood textiles, I am a newbie here. Basics were still within my research field. I worked on two ideas mainly

Voronoi bubble wood textile

First idea is a simple parametric voronoi pattern that gets concentrated in some parts while some parts are large. voronoi plays a part where it looks like triangles which can play a role to make it move as a fabric in 2 dimensions. Yet, I made it curvy a bit so it can mimic organic materials and be more adjacent to the bubble inspiration I was looking to achieve.

The final file for which I printed to laser cut looked like this

grasshopper

I used grasshopper and this is the process to replicate.

final file

As you can see, it's fully parametric and easy to change.

Midway, I did some sketching to use this textile which looked something like this.

grasshopper

Started by preparing the wood, I'll be using, by cutting into sizes and glueing the veneer to the 3mm wood and heat pressing it as can be seen. I worked it under the heat press using 115 degrees and for 50 seconds 2 times, flipping it in between..

wood start

veneer glue

veneer glue

Time to laser cut

I laser cut the file on 3 mm wood that has been veneer glued using heat press which you can take a look in the following pics

fabric on wood

I used the following settings to laser cut using Trotec program

Power : 100
Speed : 30

trotec settings

I then glued and heat pressed the fabric on the back side of the wood like this. Then peeled the unneeded scotch tape sheet that I had made earlier to keep all pieces in place while I work.

fabric on wood

fabric on wood

fabric on wood

and the final result looked like this

You can download the files here:

Kirigami 3d wood textile

Second idea was inspired by Kirigami paper art and some architectural tensile projects . I was intrigued to create a textile that in response to movement and body contour can move but of its own accord. A 3d representation of movement. A textile that responds to stretch and pressure through a second dimension.

kirigami inspirations

Started on paper with a sketch paper sketch

After that I used Rhino to draw in this process.

kirigami steps

I used the following settings to laser cut using Trotec program

Power : 100
Speed : 60

trotec settings

I laser cut the file on 3 mm wood that has been veneer glued using heat press which you can take a look in the following pics

fab1

After that, I laser cut the fabric using these settings.
I then glued and heat pressed the fabric on the back side of the wood like this

Power : 30
Speed : 1.5

trotec fabric settings

fab2

The final result looks like this

final kirigami wood textile

final kirigami wood textile

Here is the rhino file of this Wood textile pattern

Composite Materials

I was looking to create a composite material that is flexible. I have never worked with resin except of course the gelatin and agar bio resin that we made a month ago. Therefore I experimented with thinning the resin in order to create a thin flexible layer that is strengthened with a filament for which I experimented with recycled wood and tulle fabric.

Epoxy Tulle

tulle resin composite

I tried to make the inks to use in this experiment . I chose the red cabbage because of the beautiful variant shades it can produce. However they were not concentrated enough to show, especially that the resin I used was yellowish and the wool was dark. Therèfor, I used a food colour mixed with ethanol that I had at home.

ink

Resin

104 g epoxy
85 g hardener
40 g ethanol
additional ethanol based inks

Method :
* Start with arranging the materials and tools.
* Add the measured epoxy.
* Add the measured hardener and mix for a full 5 minutes.
* Add the ethanol  and mix for a full 2 minutes.
* Pour the first layer, spread and level it.
* Add the filling material ( tull in one and wool in the other) to make sure it is stretched as possible.
* Pour the second layer, spread and level it.
* Spray your inks and a couple pumps of ethanol and Mica in this case.
* Leave to dry for at least 24 hours. 

tulle resin composite

tulle resin composite

Epoxy wool

Same recipe and method as above

wool

The final result

wool resin composite

wool resin composite

Bio Plastic Composite

Bio-plastic

320 g Gelatine
320 g Glycerine
420 ml Cabbage water with acid modifier

Recipe:

* Started by boiling cabbage then adding a squeeze of a lemon.
* Filtered the cabbage water through a fabric sheet
* Measured filtered cabbage water and put it on heat
* Added glycerine and gelatine and stirred well (slowly) on medium heat
* When the mixture thickened a bit I poured a layer in the mold and spread evenly
* Added the filler and mesh layer ( the Raffia ribbon in one and the tissue paper in the other)
* Added another layer of Bio plastic and spread it 
* Sprinkled pomelo dehydrated waste  powder which I prepared earlier
* Sprinkled a bit of gold Mica
* Added weight ( glass sheet in one and the other, a silicone mold with a sugar bag in the other) 
* Left to dry

Raffia ribbon Composite

Unfortunately mold took over the piece and it was thrown before I take a final picture.

Tissue Paper Composite

Since this was a very thin layer. using glass made it very hard to take it out. Leaving me with small shattered pieces sadly. I plan on repeating the expirement some other time using a Silicone sheet for the base.


Last update: 2022-07-05
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