The metaverse "will be equal parts fear and wonder" says Liam Young

A panel including Liam Young, Refik Anadol and Space Popular expressed both optimism and trepidation about the rise of the metaverse in a talk hosted by Dezeen in collaboration with NeueHouse during Frieze Los Angeles.

Speaking on a panel organised by Dezeen as part of [NeueHouse Hollywood](http://NeueHouse Hollywood's)'s programming during Frieze Los Angeles, Young explained that the potential for creative expression in digital spaces was matched by the threat posed by privatisation and surveillance.

"There's real opportunity and excitement there, but there's also incredible danger," said Young, a speculative architect and co-founder of think tank Tomorrows Thoughts Today and research studio Unknown Fields Division.

Liam Young is a speculative architect

Young expects the metaverse to be a more mundane space than is often depicted in the media, which tends to focus on celebrity projects and luxury brands.

"The metaverse is not necessarily going to be a late capitalist Zuckerbergain fever dream," he explained.

"At the same time, it is neither going to be an escapist utopian fantasy or a flat world without the systemic horrors of the real."

"Metaverse will be equal parts fear and wonder"

"In a way, it'll be both of these things, because no technology has ever really been a solution to anything – it really just exaggerates the conditions that exist," he said.

"So the metaverse will be equal parts fear and wonder."

The talk, titled Building the Metaverse, was hosted on the rooftop terrace of NeueHouse Hollywood, and marks the first in a series of talks in collaboration between Dezeen and the workspace brand.

Hosted by design writer and Dezeen contributor Mimi Zeiger, the talk brought together a group of creatives working at the cutting edge of architecture, art and technology.

Appearing alongside Young were Lara Lesmes and Fredrik Hellberg, co-founders of architecture practice Space Popular, and digital artist and director Anadol.

Anadol, held a more optimistic view of the metaverse's potential.

[

Read:

Liam Young's Planet City could tackle climate change by housing 10 billion people in a single metropolis

](https://www.dezeen.com/2021/01/06/liam-young-planet-city-climate-change-10-billion-people-metropolis/)

"I've got more hope than fear," he said. "We have web 2.0 problems right now, we are all profiles somewhere on Earth, and we are all predictable. Hardware-software systems know where we go, what we eat, where we read and see and feel. I think that kind of profile in the cloud is most likely the 21st century imagination."

"I think the web 3.0 and eventually the metaverse has the potential to detach the profile culture, and maybe bring anonymity first of all," he explained.

"We choose to instead call it the immersive internet"

Hellberg stated that Space Popular has pushed back against use of the word "metaverse", claiming that many of the innovations associated with the term are already being used.

"The term that we're discussing here today, 'metaverse', we've actually resisted over many years, because it speaks for something new and exciting, something imagined," he said.

"We choose to instead call it the immersive internet. It's actually just a three-dimensional version of the internet. A lot of these things that we are going to experience, they are kind of already there."

During an introductory presentation, Lesmes revealed that Space Popular is working on a project exploring wayfinding in the metaverse.

Space Popular have been designing architectural "portals' that can transport" digital avatars from one virtual space to another, while using design to convey information about the space that they offer access to.

"Moving from one web page to another basically involves clicking on that blue underlined text, those hyperlinks," said Lesmes .

"When you have to switch between one three-dimensional space to another, you're very quickly confronted with the question, how do you create that transition?"

"In our research, we're trying to start to think about what we think is a good portal, what is an inviting portal, what is a portal that is also giving you enough information about the space you are entering," she continued.

"That made us start to think about these portals made of virtual fabric that potentially could give you information about this very complex network".

The still from Renderlands is by Liam Young

Partnership content

This talk was filmed by Dezeen for NeueHouse as part of a partnership. Find out more about Dezeen's partnership contenthere.

The post The metaverse "will be equal parts fear and wonder" says Liam Young appeared first on Dezeen.

#dezeenxneuehouse #architecturetalks #all #architecture #talks #spacepopular #liamyoung #refikanadol #metaverse #neuehouse

Highlights from week two of Dezeen 15 include Space Popular predicting a "three-dimensional version of the internet"

The second week of the Dezeen 15 festival saw Space Popular demonstrating a new type of portal for the metaverse while Henna Burney celebrated salt as a material for the future.

The festival will see a total of 15 creatives present ideas for how to change the world over the next 15 years. Running from 1 to 19 November, it will feature a different manifesto and live interview each weekday. See the line-up here.

Read on for some of the highlights of the second week:

Above: Lara Lesmes and Fredrik Hellberg photographed by Anna Huix. Top: the duo demonstrate their concept for metaverse portals

Space Popular predicts "three-dimensional version of the internet"

Day six: in their manifesto, architects Lara Lesmes and Fredrik Hellberg of Space Popular proposed using curtain-like gateways to allow people to move between virtual worlds.

"What's coming is a three-dimensional version of the internet," they said in a live interview with Dezeen founder and editor-in-chief Marcus Fairs.

"By 2050, all media will be spatial," they said. "We will no longer have smartphones or laptops and monitors and screens like this. Even watching a sitcom will be done in immersive digital environments."

However, this emerging 3D metaverse will require new types of spatial design to help people find their way around.

Space Popular has proposed using curtains as a metaphor. People would use a swiping gesture to pull back their current environment and reveal the one they want to go to next, as demonstrated in the video above.

Francesca Sarti by Chiara Dolma

"How can rationing become poetic?" asks Francesca Sarti

Day seven: Francesca Sarti of food design studio Arabeschi di Latte proposed a new aesthetic based on scarcity rather than abundance. This would help reduce waste and pollution from the food industry.

"Most of the environmental issues related to food are due to exaggeration, excess, overproduction and over-consumerism," she wrote. "To put it simply, they are problems of quantity."

Beatrice Galilee by Sangwoo Suh for PIN-UP

"Architects rarely taught to address their accountability" says Beatrice Galilee

Day eight: in her manifesto, curator Beatrice Galilee pointed out the disconnect between the cosy world of architecture and design and the global systems and supply chains that are doing so much damage to the planet.

"Architects have rarely been taught to address their accountability for, nor have they substantially been held accountable for, the vast chain of social and environmental consequences of construction," she wrote in her manifesto titled The Design We Can't See.

"It's time for both media and culture to take an interest," she said, adding that an emerging generation of designers is more interested in shining a light on these issues than in a traditional career.

"The radical architecture of the future may come from architects who refuse to build at all," she wrote. "The time when designers had the luxury of focusing only on end products has come to a close."

Jalila Essaïdi by Mike Roelofs

The earth's surface is a natural "layer of garbage" says Jalila Essaïdi

Day nine: designer Jalila Essaïdi turned conventional thinking on its head with a manifesto arguing that nature will eventually be able to neutralise human trash.

Therefore, she claimed, designers should work to help provide nature with new challenges rather than pursuing sustainable solutions that aim to leave the planet unchanged.

Sustainable design merely passes environmental problems on to the next generation, argues designer Jalila Essaïdi in her Dezeen 15 manifesto. Instead, we should accept that nature will find inventive ways of dealing with our waste.

"Sustainable design strategies might seem to make sense in our current capitalist system," she wrote. "Yet they merely pass the problem on to the next generation."

Left to its own devices, nature will turn "poisons into pistons of exotic engines," the Dutch designer said.

Nature itself is a polluter, she argued, since the surface of the planet is made up of its detritus. "This soil, this layer of garbage, this trash coat of ever-increasing complexity, is what gives this planet its very name: earth."

Henna Burney by Iwan Baan

"Salt is a material of the future" says Henna Burney

Day 10: Henna Burney, a designer and researcher at Atelier Luma in France, wrote about the potential of salt as a raw material for products and interiors and even as a potential source of sustainable power.

"The future will be built with materials that are both new and old," she wrote in her manifesto.

"Natural but overlooked materials such as salt have extraordinary potential. We only need to look around with fresh eyes, rediscover lost knowledge and chart new ways of thinking about materials and their ecosystems."

The post Highlights from week two of Dezeen 15 include Space Popular predicting a "three-dimensional version of the internet" appeared first on Dezeen.

#dezeen15festival #all #design #technology #digitaldesign #spacepopular #virtualarchitectureanddesign #metaverse

Space Popular proposes a "civic infrastructure for virtual teleportation" to help people navigate the metaverse

In their manifesto for the Dezeen 15 online festival, architects Lara Lesmes and Fredrik Hellberg of Space Popular propose portals made of virtual textiles to transform the experience of passing between digital worlds.

"Rather than swap pages when we switch tabs or click a link, we replace the entire environment around us," they write in their manifesto.

"In the coming 15 years, we must create a civic infrastructure for virtual teleportation that breaks with the discriminatory and opaque nature of locked doors, hidden vigilance, privacy breaches and concealed discrimination."

They propose "a threaded network of virtual textiles that our virtual selves pull aside to move between virtual environments.

"Such textiles only become apparent once we aim to touch them, pulling apart in mid-air the environment we are in and allowing us to access another."

Alongside their manifesto, Dezeen has published a range of Space Popular's projects that make use of textiles as well as a teaser of their upcoming exhibition at Sir John Soane's Museum.

The Dezeen 15 festival features 15 manifestos presenting ideas that could change the world over the next 15 years. Each contributor will also take part in a live video interview.

See the line-up of contributors here and watch the video interview with Space Popular live on Dezeen later today.

Threaded thresholds: the fabric of civic teleportation

As digital media gains a third dimension through immersive technology, our cultural, political and experiential understanding of how we access and navigate spaces is challenged. The coming 15 years will see the weaving of physical and virtual environments become denser as our scrolls turn into strolls, and our cursor grows into our full-body avatar.

Rather than swap pages when we switch tabs or click a link, we replace the entire environment around us. The speed and manner in which these shifts happen, as well as the gesture that triggers them, are at once the affordance and infrastructure for accessing and navigating the virtual environment. In the coming 15 years, we must create a civic infrastructure for virtual teleportation that breaks with the discriminatory and opaque nature of locked doors, hidden vigilance, privacy breaches and concealed discrimination.

The coming 15 years will see the weaving of physical and virtual environments become denser

Commonly referred to as portals, one of the most popular means to switch from one environment to another is door-like or hole-like thresholds that grant us entrance into another virtual environment of any kind and size. Such travelling devices have existed for centuries in oral history, literature, film, gaming, and naturally now in immersive media. The portal provides a familiar means to link environments that would otherwise be completely incomprehensible to us.

The contrast that comes from opening a door from the living room into outer space is thrilling but yet coherent thanks to the familiarity of opening a door and crossing its threshold. When we cross a portal we build imaginary walls around the environments we are shifting between, no matter how vast they were, constructing a notion of the overall map that resembles a matrix of interconnected rooms (using here Robin Evans’ term from his essay Figures, Doors and Passages). This recognisable notion makes the experience readable, relatable, and therefore meaningful.

Virtual environments are, however, currently existing within centralised platforms that create isolated islands – or, shall we say, fortresses. Some platforms have better solutions than others in providing the means to teleport between environments contained within. Now, moving from one platform to another is a whole other journey that often takes us through some kind of app store where we are meant to scroll through browser-like interfaces in virtual displays floating around us. Once we press on one, after possibly a few prompts and some darkness, we are in the new place.

The means of teleportation across the virtual environment must eventually become a coherent protocol

This brings up the main issues we are concerned with. Firstly, the fact that most immersive environments are currently contained within several layers of commercially driven platforms (it must be mentioned that there are promising open source initiatives such as Hubs by Mozilla); and secondly, the instability and unreliability conveyed by the means of access (you may not be granted access and never know why, or the environment might switch off as a result of something completely out of your control).

The means of teleportation across the virtual environment must eventually become a coherent protocol: a three-dimensional version of the hyperlink in the form of a portal that at once grants access to an environment as well as the necessary information about it. Such infrastructure must exist outside private or commercial entities and be of civic character: a public and open protocol that weaves together environments into a virtual urban fabric, the fabric of civic teleportation.

We propose a threaded network of virtual textiles that our virtual selves pull aside to move between virtual environments. Such textiles only become apparent once we aim to touch them, pulling apart in mid-air the environment we are in and allowing us to access another. Thus, they are parallax tapestries that, on closer inspection, reveal through the quality of their threads the conditions of the space behind them which we agree to once we cross the threshold.

Propositions

Here are eight propositions for a threaded portal infrastructure for the virtual environment. The Fabric of Civic Teleportation should be:

Consistent, stable, reliable, dependable, certain

The way we move through the virtual environment must provide reliable and dependable spaces of access that do not change with every update. Communities require a degree of stability and certainty to build upon.

Readable, relatable, symbolic

The portals to and across virtual environments must contain information about the space behind them which are widely legible. This will require the creation of a new grammar of material behaviours, graphics, and signs to be incorporated across all access points.

Shared, networked, interconnected

The portals to virtual environments must be interconnected and consistent throughout, appearing the same to all citizens of the virtual environment at any given time. We must perceive the same if we are to understand a space as shared and a group of people as a community.

Inclusive, transparent, fair

In virtual environments discrimination, inequality and injustice will be possible in completely new and less transparent ways than what we already experience today. Owners of virtual environments are capable of using biometric data and other personal information to determine if access is restricted or refused. We must build transparent civic systems of access to the virtual environment where discrimination becomes visible and therefore can be addressed.

Civic, public, communal

Currently, browsers are the unquestionable access point, the place where it all begins, for all of our virtual strolls. The fact that most browsers are owned and operated by for-profit companies means that from that first step we already enter a commercial realm. The means of navigation must operate as civic infrastructure for the benefit of its citizens.

Cheap, efficient, affordable, sustainable

The calculations involved in bringing us from one virtual place to another, and allowing us to stroll through options, must be computationally efficient and consume as little energy as possible. The environmental impact of virtual spaces should also be part of the information communicated to the citizens of the virtual environment at the point of entry.

Interoperable, compatible, open

The hyperlink is integral to the World Wide Web as we know it, experienced so far mostly in its flat version, through screens. The underlined blue text or the button-like graphic take on a third dimension and become portals as we enter the virtual environment. In doing so, such portals must be based on protocols that are able to exchange and make use of information across spaces.

Woven, threaded, interlinked

The portals across virtual environments must be able to express how they are woven together, showing threads to other places and revealing the knitted network they are a part of. The expression of such portals must also be familiar and cognitively coherent with our only three-dimensional frame of reference: the built environment.

Fabric provides a versatile affordance (fabric can take many shapes and sizes without appearing distorted, exaggerated, or unrealistic); an inviting metaphor (a curtain demarcates space while not locking it, thus – as opposed to a door – it provides a welcoming threshold to cross); and a canvas for information (the knitting and embroidery of a tapestry provide many layers in which both figurative and abstracted information can be read prior to accessing the environment behind it).

Above: Space Popular photographed by Anna Huix. Main and first image: virtual reality portals designed by Space Popular

Space Popular is a multidisciplinary design and research studio founded by architects Lara Lesmes and Fredrik Hellberg. The duo has pioneered the development of virtual architecture, designing the world's first virtual-reality architecture conference.

Find out more about Space Popular ›

The post Space Popular proposes a "civic infrastructure for virtual teleportation" to help people navigate the metaverse appeared first on Dezeen.

#dezeen15festival #all #design #digitaldesign #spacepopular #virtualarchitectureanddesign #metaverse

Space Popular sets out its vision for digital portals made of virtual textiles

Day six of the Dezeen 15 virtual festival sees architects Lara Lesmes and Fredrik Hellberg of Space Popular explain their idea for "a civic infrastructure for virtual teleportation" in a live video interview. Watch live now.

"Rather than swap pages when we switch tabs or click a link, we replace the entire environment around us," they write in their manifesto.

"In the coming 15 years, we must create a civic infrastructure for virtual teleportation that breaks with the discriminatory and opaque nature of locked doors, hidden vigilance, privacy breaches and concealed discrimination.

Instead, they propose "a threaded network of virtual textiles that our virtual selves pull aside to move between virtual environments."

[

Read:

Space Popular proposes a "civic infrastructure for virtual teleportation" to help people navigate the metaverse

](https://www.dezeen.com/2021/11/08/space-popular-manifesto-dezeen-15/)

"Such textiles only become apparent once we aim to touch them, pulling apart in mid-air the environment we are in and allowing us to access another."

Alongside their manifesto, the studio will showcase 10 projects that make use of textiles as well as a teaser of their upcoming exhibition at Sir John Soane's Museum.

Space Popular is a multidisciplinary design and research studio founded by architects Lara Lesmes and Fredrik Hellberg. The duo has pioneered the development of virtual architecture, designing the world's first virtual-reality architecture conference.

The Dezeen 15 festival features 15 manifestos presenting ideas that could change the world over the next 15 years. Each contributor will also take part in a live video interview.

See the line-up of contributors here.

The portrait of Space Popular is byAnna Huix.

The post Space Popular sets out its vision for digital portals made of virtual textiles appeared first on Dezeen.

#dezeen15festival #all #talks #digitaldesign #spacepopular #livestreams #virtualarchitectureanddesign

Space Popular designs virtual portal for Sir John Soane's museum exhibition

Architecture studio Space Popular has teamed up with Sir John Soane's Museum in London to create an exhibition that looks at "the magics and mechanics" of virtual travel.

The exhibition, called Space Popular: The Portal Galleries, opens in June 2022 and will present a history of portals in fiction, as well as studies of physical portals in the museum itself and a virtual reality portal.

Space Popular is offering a teaser of the exhibition today as part of its guest editorship for Dezeen 15, a digital festival celebrating Dezeen's 15th birthday.

As part of the festival the studio's takeover, founders Lara Lesmes and Fredrik Hellberg are talking to Dezeen's editor-in-chief Marcus Fairs in a live interview about the increasingly important role of textiles in virtual spaces, which was the focus of a manifesto written by the duo.

A virtual reality portal by Space Popular

Space Popular has worked with the museum on the exhibition since 2018, and the design and layout of the space informed the studio's approach to the project.

"Our understanding of virtual space finds its precedents well before any form of electronic media, going back all the way to frescoes and tapestries," Lesmes and Hellberg told Dezeen.

"We see the Soane as a device that enables the virtual experience of space, not only because of the objects we can find there but how they are contained and displayed," it added.

"Folding walls, reflections, or thresholds full of artefacts, are just some of the numerous types of portals we find in the house museum."

Visitors can "enter a new portal" through museum

The exhibition will feature a new spatial film that visitors will experience through virtual reality headsets, which will allow them to "enter a new portal" through the museum – though the studio can't yet reveal where this will lead.

According to the studio, the history of the museum, which is located in the house of 18th-century architect Sir John Soane and showcases his belongings and collections, also had an influence on the exhibition subject.

[

Read:

Space Popular proposes a "civic infrastructure for virtual teleportation" to help people navigate the metaverse

](https://www.dezeen.com/2021/11/08/space-popular-manifesto-dezeen-15/)

"As an immensely privileged person's private home turned free-museum-open-to-all, the Sir John Soane Museum is also a fitting setting to think about the kind of exclusion and elitism so often seen in fiction, where portals are often used as narrative devices to separate the people who can pass through the portal, and those who cannot," Lesmes and Hellberg added.

Accompanying the virtual portal will be a historical study looking at close to 1,000 examples of portals in fiction, including the wardrobe from The Chronicles of Narnia and the front door of Howl's Moving Castle.

"Many of our most beloved portals are actually used to enable very problematic narratives"

Lesmes and Hellberg said the research for the exhibition made them change their minds about some former favourite fictional gateways.

"Perhaps the most surprising discovery in our study of portals in fiction is that many of our most beloved portals are actually used to enable very problematic narratives of elitism, egomania, racism and colonialism," the studio explained.

"Hence some of our favorites are not our favorites anymore. The majority of portals are, however, incredible makers of blissful magic that are a true joy to imagine."

Though it can only be experienced digitally, the virtual portal that Space Popular is designing for the exhibition has its roots in physical gateways that the studio has come across.

[

Read:

The metaverse will allow you to "extend your body into architecture" says Fredrik Hellberg of Space Popular

](https://www.dezeen.com/2021/04/09/metaverse-meet-up-dezeen-club/)

Hellberg and Lesmes believe that referencing existing doorways can help enhance the virtual reality experience.

"The doors, thresholds, portals, et cetera, that we have physically experienced form the basis for any means to move between virtual spaces," the studio said.

"The more we tap into the collective expectation of what a portal might be, the more comfortable and meaningful the virtual experience will be."

Space Popular is one of 15 contributors to the Dezeen 15 festival, which features 15 manifestos presenting ideas that can change the world over the next 15 years.

See the line-up of contributors here and watch the video interview here.

The image is courtesy of Space Popular.

Space Popular: The Portal Galleries will be on show at Sir John Soane's Museum from 29 June til 25 September 2022. SeeDezeen Events Guide for an up-to-date list of architecture and design events taking place around the world.

The post Space Popular designs virtual portal for Sir John Soane's museum exhibition appeared first on Dezeen.

#all #installations #design #exhibitions #virtualreality #spacepopular

Ten projects involving colourful textiles designed by Space Popular

From elaborate stage designs to upholstered sculptures, here are ten projects by architecture and design studio Space Popular that make use of polychromatic textile designs.

Space Popular has worked with textiles for nearly a decade, often using digital printing techniques to create decorative tapestries and motifs that explore various themes.

In more recent years, the studio has also turned its attention to creating textiles for the infrastructure in both augmented and virtual reality environments.

It is exhibiting 10 of its key projects involving textiles today as part of its guest editorship for Dezeen 15, a digital festival celebrating Dezeen's 15th birthday.

[

Read:

Space Popular proposes a "civic infrastructure for virtual teleportation" to help people navigate the metaverse

](https://www.dezeen.com/2021/11/08/space-popular-manifesto-dezeen-15/)

During the studio's takeover, founders Lara Lesmes and Fredrik Hellberg will also talk to Dezeen's editor-in-chief Marcus Fairs in a live interview about the increasingly important role of textiles in virtual spaces as they become more intertwined with our physical reality.

This was the focus of a manifesto written by the duo as part of its contribution to the festival, named Threads of Thresholds.

Space Popular is one of 15 creatives presenting a manifesto for a better world at Dezeen 15. Others participating include Winy Maas, Es Devlin and Neri Oxman. Find out more details about all of the participants here.

Read on for 10 projects by Space Popular that make use of textiles.

Infinity Spa, 2016

Back-lit cotton curtains break up the pared-back treatment rooms of the Infinity Spa, a day spa built within a small three-storey building in Bangkok, Thailand.

The curtains were designed by Space Popular to create the feeling of infinite space, despite the size of the building, giving the project its name.

Photo is by Davide Calafa

The Wardian Case, 2019

Set in the tapestry rooms at the Palazzo Reale Milano in Italy, The Wardian Case was an upholstered sculpture that contained an immersive virtual reality film exploring the historical use of textiles to transport information through time.

The sculpture, which was covered in synthetic suede, specifically referenced the Wardian Case – a container designed to transport rare plants between different continents invented in 1829.

The Stones of Venice, 2018

The Stones of Venice is a digitally-printed cotton gown, which Space Popular modelled on Japanese kimonos worn in formal ceremonies.

It is decorated with illustrations, colours and patterns that are all personal to James Taylor Foster, a curator and writer for whom the garment was made.

WonderFruit Festival, 2015

In 2015, Space Popular collaborated with Bang Bang Collective and Issue Fashion on the design of the Soi Stage at WonderFruit Festival in Pattaya, Thailand.

A thin metal structure was used to support a series of fabric frames that were adorned with brightly-coloured motifs resembling columns and roofs. It is a nod to the temporary stages that are often used in China for opera performances.

Photo is by Ben Blossom

The Glass Chain, 2017

An alternative future for the use of glass in architecture was the focus of this mixed-reality installation. It was informed by the Glass Chain Letters – a famous correspondence between a small group of German architects in 1919 about what form architecture should take in the future.

The Glass Chain consisted of a kaleidoscopic glass sculpture, a daybed, and a series of decorated cotton drapes.

Photo is by Fredrik Hellberg

How I Started Hanging out with Home, 2018

How I Started Hanging out with Home was a textile-based exhibition that visualised a future where buildings take on human features due to the increasing power of domestic appliances.

Installed at the Magazin exhibition space in Vienna, it was composed of a series of wall hangings and upholstered architectural sculptures with humanistic qualities, intended to make visitors feel as though they were intruding on the space.

Portland Place Out of Character, 2017

Portland Place Out of Character was a 25-square-metre cotton textile that was hung within the lobby of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) in London in 2017.

The textile is illustrated with various facade designs that were originally proposed for the home of the RIBA, now named 66 Portland Place, as part of a competition held in 1932.

Photo is by Jeanette Hägglund

Value in the Virtual, 2018

Two different environments, one physical and one virtual, made up this solo exhibition curated by Space Popular for ArkDes in Stockholm, Sweden.

The project explored the value of architecture in the design of virtual worlds and, in the physical part of the exhibition, featured ten giant carpet prints that depicted various scenes.

Space is the Place, 2016

One hundred metres of thick cotton fabric were used to create this installation for a Christmas party in the lecture hall of London's Architectural Association School of Architecture.

Wrapped around a series of existing columns, the fabric was adorned with elevation drawings of the string of Georgian buildings occupied by the school, but with a playful graphic twist.

Photo is by Fredrik Hellberg

The Venn Room, 2019

Physical and virtual reality merged within The Venn Room, a mixed-reality installation created by Space Popular for the Tallinn Architecture Biennale in Estonia.

As part of the installation, the studio created a series of textile wall hangings that depicted cross-sections of domestic environments within "the augmented future" – an enhanced version of the real world.

The post Ten projects involving colourful textiles designed by Space Popular appeared first on Dezeen.

#all #design #textiles #roundups #spacepopular

Andrés Reisinger, Space Popular, Amber Slooten and Charlotte Taylor discuss how "the virtual world and the real world will integrate"

This video of Dezeen Club's first metaverse meet-up on 7 April features speakers Space Popular, Andrés Reisinger, Amber Jae Slooten and Charlotte Taylor discussing the rise of virtual worlds.

Over 200 attendees represented by avatars joined the meet-up, held at a virtual rooftop bar hosted in spatial video-chat platform Gather.

The event was organised to explore the idea of the metaverse, which is the emerging digital universe where people can experience a parallel life to their real-world existence.

At the event, speakers discussed topics including the rise of cryptocurrencies and NFTs that allow people to trade digital goods, and the impact of the metaverse on the human mind and body.

The Dezeen Club event saw speakers address an audience of over 200 avatars

"The virtual world and the real world will integrate," said Slooten, founder of virtual fashion studio The Fabricant. "For me, that is a very interesting part. Where does my physical body end and where does the digital body begin?"

"The next step would be to really start to challenge the way that we occupy a body at all," added Hellberg, whose studio Space Popular recently designed a venue for the first-ever architecture conference held in virtual reality.

"In VR if you have a tail, for instance, it takes only a few minutes before your body gets used to having a tail, which means that you'll very soon get ready for having another arm and then all sorts of other body-related things."

The metaverse can potentially dissolve the boundaries between the human body, fashion and architecture, Hellberg said.

A digital-only garment designed for the metaverse, created by The Fabricant fashion studio

The panel also discussed how NFT auctions are offering designers a new business model by allowing them to sell virtual furniture, clothes and buildings.

Slooten‘s fashion house The Fabricant designs digital-only clothing for virtual bodies to wear and pioneered the first digital-only garment, which sold as an NFT for $90,500.

Reisinger, a designer who recently held an NFT furniture auction that netted more than $450,000, explained how virtual objects can become more valuable than their physical counterparts.

"Digital has quite a few qualities that are verifiable such as scarcity and traceability," he said, noting that the virtual model of his Hortensia chair is worth more than the physical version.

Reisinger addressed concerns about the environmental impact of the NFT market, drawing attention to disproportionate lack of scrutiny applied to established markets.

"The ecological impact that NFT processes generate are insignificant compared to the damage that the current banking system is causing to the environment," he said.

Andrés Reisinger's Hortensia Chair NFT went viral on social media.

The speakers were optimistic about the growing role that NFTs and virtual spaces are playing in the design world.

"We are not escaping from reality," said Reisinger. "We are just expanding our consciousness into this digital realm."

Slooten expressed hope that new virtual forms could revolutionise how we connect to others. "To me, this feels like a new interconnected web that will create more of a world-centric view, rather than an egocentric view," she said.

Lesmes summarised the timeliness of the discussion, stating: "love it or hate it, if you are not a part of it, then you'll be late."

Space Popular designed the world's first VR architecture conference in 2020

Dezeen Clubis a response to the fact that people are missing the social contact and chance encounters of real-world events as a result of the pandemic.

The club, which will initially be invitation-only, will give members access to enhanced functionality on Dezeen's websites as well as access to VIP events in both cyberspace and the real world. For more details, email [email protected].

The post Andrés Reisinger, Space Popular, Amber Slooten and Charlotte Taylor discuss how "the virtual world and the real world will integrate" appeared first on Dezeen.

#vrar #all #talks #videos #spacepopular #thefabricant #andrésreisinger #virtualarchitectureanddesign #nfts #charlottetaylor

The metaverse will allow you to "extend your body into architecture" says Fredrik Hellberg of Space Popular

The virtual world and the real world will become one and the human body will merge with fashion and architecture, according to speakers at Dezeen Club's metaverse meet-up event held at a virtual rooftop bar earlier this week.

"The virtual world and the real world will integrate," said Amber Slooten of virtual fashion studio The Fabricant.

"There will be like a virtual layer on top of reality that you'll be able to switch on and off," she added. "And there will be virtual worlds that you can go into."

The Dezeen Club event saw speakers address an audience of avatars (above) at a virtual rooftop bar (top)

"It's already beginning to happen where architecture, fashion and the body sort of becomes one,"said Fredrik Hellberg of architecture studio Space Popular.

He added that virtual worlds will allow people to "control or actually extend your body into architecture".

Slooten and Hellberg were among speakers at Dezeen Club's metaverse meet-up on Wednesday, which also included Charlotte Taylor and Andrés Reisinger.

Dezeen Club guests could choose from a limited range of simple avatars

Held at a virtual rooftop bar created in spatial video-chat platform Gather.Town, the event was attended by over 200 invited guests who moved around the venue with digital avatars and took part in video chats with other attendees.

A panel discussion at the event saw leading figures from digital design discussing the metaverse – a term used to describe the emerging digital universe where people can experience a parallel life to their real-world existence.

Metaverse will let users choose identities

The metaverse will allow people to adopt new identities, personalities and even bodies, speakers said.

"The way we look at clothes now, the way we look at identity in general, is still very much tied to physical reality," said Slooten.

"But what if suddenly I would be able to wear a dress that would extend as far as someone walking around me, and then suddenly my dress would connect to their dress, and there would be some kind of social interaction?"

Guests mingling at the Dezeen Club metaverse meet-up

In the metaverse, your avatar can take any form, added Hellberg, allowing you to experience what it's like to have a completely different body.

"In virtual reality, if you have a tail, for instance, it takes only a few minutes before your body gets used to having a tail," he said.

"This means that you'll very, very soon get ready for having another arm and then all sorts of other body-related things."

"That's one of our biggest predictions of what's going to happen in the next 20 years or so," he added.

Katerina Kovalenko of Kei Kei Kju gave a live performance via video at the Dezeen Club event

Hellberg explained the concept of homuncular flexibility, which describes the psychological and physiological effects of inhabiting an avatar body in virtual reality.

"I think it's really exciting, this concept of homuncular flexibility [and] the fact that the human mind is very good at adopting new ways of inhabiting different bodies," he said.

New business models

The metaverse is also providing designers with a new business model as they explore ways to sell virtual furniture, clothes and even entire buildings.

In 2019, The Fabricant sold the first-ever virtual dress for $9,500 at an NFT auction.

"This caused an outrage everywhere because people really didn't get it," said Slooten, describing the reaction at the time.

The virtual version of Andrés Reisinger's Hortensia chair is more valuable than the real version

Today, the concept of virtual products is more accepted thanks to a series of high-profile NFT auctions such as the sale of Krista Kim's virtual dwelling Mars House and a series of architectural renderings by Alexis Christodoulou.

Andrés Reisinger, a designer who was among the first to sell digital furniture, said that virtual objects can be more valuable than their real-world counterparts.

"Digital has quite a few qualities that are verifiable such as scarcity and traceability," he said, adding that the digital version of his Hortensia chair is worth more than the physical version.

The Fabricant designs virtual outfits for avatars that only exist in the metaverse

"It's very easy to trace [digital] assets and know where they are, how many of them there are and who has them. And also they don't age," he added.

"I think that the use of materials that cannot exist in real life is also something that can make it more valuable," added Slooten.

Dezeen Club's metaverse meet-up also featured live musical performances plus networking opportunities in a virtual lounge and bar.

Here, attendees could gather around virtual tables or on virtual sofas to chat, with many guests staying long after the event ended to continue conversations.

A virtual fashion show by The Fabricant

"It's the first time I was in a virtual event where the virtual part didn't feel like a plan B," said reSITE creative captain Radka Ondrackova, who attended the event.

"I was experiencing a very thrilling state of mind around the dichotomy of being present or absent in either of those environments with my not-so-comfy chair reminding me constantly about the physical one."

Designer Soo Wilkinson, another attendee, said that despite technical hitches that caused the sound to drop out "it was still good to look at the pictures and really funny seeing all the avatars sat listening intently on virtual chairs!"

Space Popular's design for Punto de Inflexión, a VR architecture conference held last year

At the panel discussion, Lara Lesmes of Space Popular argued that virtual spaces called for a new kind of architectural language that speaks to people rather than architects.

"Virtual environments are bringing to the forefront of architectural design really critical thinking about what architecture is doing semiotically," she said. "What is it doing as a true language, not the architectural language that only architects speak?"

Noting how attendees at the event made use of digital tables and chairs even though they didn't need to, she said: "There is a necessity for codes and a necessity for atmosphere. This is architecture as the spoken word."

"What [virtual architecture and furniture] are doing is not just allowing us to sit or protecting us from the weather, but they are also saying a lot."

"Routines that we have built in the physical world will be our library to build the virtual," she added. "And eventually, we might start developing new ones."

Dezeen Club is a response to the fact that people are missing the social contact and chance encounters of real-world events as a result of the pandemic.

The club, which will initially be invitation-only, will give members access to enhanced functionality on Dezeen's websites as well as access to VIP events in both cyberspace and the real world. For more details, email [email protected].

The post The metaverse will allow you to "extend your body into architecture" says Fredrik Hellberg of Space Popular appeared first on Dezeen.

#all #architecture #technology #news #dezeen #design #virtualreality #spacepopular #virtualarchitectureanddesign