Tactility Factory
This collaborative materials project with Trish Belford (textile designer) (2005 –2017) began as a creative project with the conceptual drive of ‘making hard things soft’. It led to two parallel research tracts- 1. Resolving the technical challenges of fusing textiles and concrete together and 2. Reflecting on the cultural challenges and hybrid processes that emerged. The resultant technology was patented, commercialised globally and attracted multiple funding and design awards.
Trans-plastics
This project (2018-2021) is in collaboration with colleagues at Queen’s University Belfast and Robert Jamison Architects. We are designing and manufacturing, using roto-moulding as a production system, an interlocking block from waste plastic. We aim to draw out the aesthetic qualities of waste plastic whilst designing for a circular economy. The project is one part of the EPSRC funded project, Advancing Creative Circular Economies for Plastics via Technological-Social Transitions (ACCEPT)
Forest Stacks
Forest Stacks (2018-2019) was a community building initiative based in Garvagh Forest. We worked with a team of architects, artists, apprentices, and local people to create temporary public spaces for everyone to use in the forest. A part of the wider Playstacks initiative, Forest Stacks contributed to the Garvagh Peoples Forest Project which creates value in the forest with and for local people enhancing the forest, community life and well-being.