10. Textile Scaffold

Research

I love the biomorphic designs of Ernesto Netto. I am quite fond of building soft sheds with see-through fabric so his work speaks to me a lot. Creating organic cocoons is a bliss.

All photos were taken from this gallery website.

The leather-moulding work of the brand Kofta is absolutely sublime.

The bioresin invented by Alicia Valdes for her jewellery brand blows my mind. She extracts collagen from fish bones.

Textile biocomposite and bioresin

Process

In the week of biomaterials, I notied that alginate dries in a very solid way. Therefore, this week, idea was to experiement more with alginate and test how dried results could take the shape of what is inside of it.

Mix paste alginate based with calcium chloride based solution. I mixed alginate with beer hops, and shredded textile.

Recipe paste beer hops 100g beer hops 200ml water 6g alginate 16g glycerin

Recipe paste shredded textiles 100g shreded textiles 200ml water 6g alginate 16g glycerin

Recipe water based solution 10% calcium chloride 90% water

Crystallization

Process

I wanted to see what crystals would look like on my buttons that are made of broken glass. Since the aestethic of crystals is similar to broken glass i thought it would blend well together.

Recipe given in lecture

1. One cup very hot tap water + 3 tablespoon borax
2. Half cup epsom / half cup very hot tap water
3. 1/4 alum / half cup of very hot tap water

Results

The metal of my buttons stopped the reaction of the recipe of epsom and borax, on the other hand the floor of the Green Fabric showed my recipes worked after showing crystals a couple days later :)))

However, alum worked very well.

Conclusion

For further research with glycrerin, I take note that the more shredded the material is, the easier it is to form designs with.

Crystallization is an interesting process to present something as it immediately makes things look precious while being plastic free, child-labour free, and local.