With our attempts to cultivate nature, humankind causes the rising of a next nature, which is wild and unpredictable as ever. Wild systems, genetic surprises, autonomous machinery and splendidly beautiful black flowers. Nature changes along with us.
Once, we wore footwear to protect our feet from the hostile influences of our natural environment. But with the replacement of our natural environment by a world of design, the function of our footwear changed along.
From a purely functional piece of clothing, the shoe became a desirable aesthetic object and a status symbol. Many people (at least in the western part of the world) believe that he shoes you wear, kind of make you who you are…
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), unhealthy diet is amongst one of the leading causes of the major non-communicable diseases. Can design encourage people to rethink their relationship with healthy food to gain a balanced diet?
The series of food packaging were created from the observations on personal behaviors. Using the recognizable stereotyping packaging would make people feel more physically and physiologically connected with those daily objects. By giving the good food a little make over, it could contribute the availability of healthy food and encourages people to make a change for their everyday life.
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Sometimes you come across something that is not directly related to Next Nature, but só well made that it deserves a place on this website. Logorama, a 16 minute animation by the french design studio H5, is such a piece. That said, we can freely explore where this movie dóes relate to what we’re doing here…
The symbolic power of animals has always appealed to people. There are numerous examples throughout human history where representations of animals play a significant role in the cycle in which meanings are determined: from the animal-gods of the ancient egyptians via the lamb of god to more recent examples like Mickey Mouse and the eagle – a symbol of power in both the USA and nazi Germany.
The American Eagle and the Nazi Adler, here both featured on a coin.
In his short animation Augmented (Hyper)Reality, Keiichi Matsuda’s offers a glimpse of an alternate universe, with augmented reality cranked up to the next level. But what to think of these kind of slick animations that provide us with either utopian or dystopian visions of our technofuture?
Above: artist impression 2003 | below: Nasa January 2010
When developers launched the globe project just off Dubai’s coast in 2003, they hoped that the rich and famous would land there to populate the 300 islands.
Within five years Nakheel Properties leveled up 11 billion cubic feet of sand and 47 million tons of rock. However, a year ago (2009) the work stopped and now it looks like the project will never be completed. While officially the project has just been delayed, the obvious conclusion would be that it is the economic recession causing the islands to gradually wash back into the sea.
Printer ink is assumed to be the most expensive liquid on Earth. If you believe the many websites that quoted the figure above. But little research learns that this is figure is — of course — incomplete. Read more »
Coca-Cola© succeeds in what most NGO’s try to achieve: getting the goods to the poor in the 3rd world Africa. For most people there, a Coke is easier to get and cheaper than a bottle of drinking water. One might say that we shouldn’t encourage them to drink that much Coke, but we can also use the system. Colalife© aims to use the efficiency of the Coca-Cola distribution chain to ship medicines to the places that need them. Parasiting on the crates of Coke, the containers fit perfectly in the spaces unused.
Unsure how this melting polar bear ice sculpture created by artist Mark Coreth fits in Next Nature mythology. The art piece was presented last week in Copenhagen and is sponsored by WWF to create an awareness on the human impact on the climate.
Once the ice sculpture has melted – which should take a day or ten – a metal skeleton remains that remotely reminds of the metal skeleton of the Terminator. Should we read this as a symbol suggesting that biological species are being be replaced by technological species? Anyhow it does provoke one to reflect upon the question if and what species would take the polar bears place if it were to become extinct.
Related: The World without Technology, The Order Electrus, Killer Robots. Thanks Dreg.
Reliable data on economic growth is hard to come by in many parts of the world, especially in developing countries. Yet according to scientists, outer space offers a new perspective for measuring economic growth.
Using satellite images of nighttime lights, J. Vernon Henderson, Adam Storeygard, and David N. Weil from Brown University have created a new framework for estimating a country or region’s gross domestic product, or GDP by observing the changes in a country’s “night lights” as seen from outer space.
“Consumption of nearly all goods in the evening requires lights,” they write in a National Bureau of Economic Research working paper. “As income rises, so does light usage per person, in both consumption activities and many investment activities.”
It’s funny how these mixed up brands still feel like they make sense. Peculiar image of the week.
