Aston, a resting place for everyone.
Inspiration
This project was about creating a public environment for everybody. The task was to make no one feel excluded from the resting place. I worked with Hampus Forsman on this socially sustainable assignment.
We took inspiration from nature because nature is for anyone and so will this resting place. We used the shapes and forms of what mother nature has to offer, such as waves from the sea, shapes made by sand in the desert, mountains, and even a blanket that we waved and filmed in slow motion. The blanket symbols the wind.
Creating
With nature-inspired pictures and videos, we thought that any movement can be paused to create beautiful shapes that can inspire us. In the videos the shapes change every second. With a bit of fast sketching we found something that looked exciting.
The sketches needed to come to life, so we would understand them more from all the perspectives. It's at this kind of moment clay is your best friend. In that way we could create the shapes that we saw from our inspiration quickly.
We then used the clay models as a foundation for our CAD calculations. In CAD we could create all the possible shapes that were most logical for a resting place.
At this stage, we had to filter our ideas and think in a productive way, “how would they be made?”. We polished the shapes on the edges so it would be possible to make the benches in an easier way.
Small concept models are a good way to show how the benches will look, so we did one of each in the size of 1:16. With the help of a laser cutter, all the 20+ pieces were perfectly cut to fit the model. As in nature, no piece is like the other, which makes these benches special and more close to the earth.
Results
The benches got shapes where you have to feel and find your comfortable position, just like you would on a rock or somewhere else in nature. You can lean on, sit straight, or even lay down, all because of the organic shape the benches have. Throughout the process, we thought that humans have changed over the centuries, but nature has stayed the same. So why change nature that isn't made for change, when it’s the human who needs to adjust just like they’ve since the beginning of time. Nature is for everyone and so are these nature inspired-benches.
