This project by Vanessa Harden and Kevin Hill intends to create a new design process that fosters a collaboration between honeybees and humans to create bespoke furnishings. The answers to the following questions will dictate the course of the project:
- Can a product be fabricated through a partnership between bees and humans?
- How might we work together without compromising the health of the hive?
- How will the placement of the object within the hive alter the final aesthetics of the product?
- How would this design collaboration physically manifest itself in a functional product?
We believe that the honey bees will build ornate wax structures onto the surface of objects introduced into the hive. Upon removing the object from the hive, we intend to use modern material process's to render the product into a functional piece of design.
The hives are located in central London allowing the bees to forage from the various local communities to source the materials needed to embellish what will become our final product.
Through interspecies collaboration this project will offer an alternative definition to the word 'community' to include other co-inhabitants of the earth in the process of creation. This process will result in the production of an artifact which will be designed by humans and embellished by bees, bringing together modern technology and nature.
- Can a product be fabricated through a partnership between bees and humans?
- How might we work together without compromising the health of the hive?
- How will the placement of the object within the hive alter the final aesthetics of the product?
- How would this design collaboration physically manifest itself in a functional product?
We believe that the honey bees will build ornate wax structures onto the surface of objects introduced into the hive. Upon removing the object from the hive, we intend to use modern material process's to render the product into a functional piece of design.
The hives are located in central London allowing the bees to forage from the various local communities to source the materials needed to embellish what will become our final product.
Through interspecies collaboration this project will offer an alternative definition to the word 'community' to include other co-inhabitants of the earth in the process of creation. This process will result in the production of an artifact which will be designed by humans and embellished by bees, bringing together modern technology and nature.
