Bio Material Workshop

This workshop was organized by Ines Burdiles at a nearby elementary school in Poblenou with the aim to bring material awareness to children. Though a multi session workshop children were able to explore concepts of materiality, circularity, and waste empowering them to form their own ideas around material life cycles.

After a session of creative imagining and interaction with existing bio materials, created by myself and Ines Burdiles during our masters program at The Institute of Advanced Architecture, students were prompted to imagine what they could make and were invited to bring waste from their homes they could utilize in the following workshop.

In the follow up session students created molds for their materials followed by a group cooking activity. Here, students followed existing recipes to create their own bio materials out of both previously collected waste, such as orange peels and coffee, and personal waste from their homes. After setting the materials in the molds we invited them to describe the process and evolution of their journey through text and illustration. Each of the students was given a journal in which to write down their experimentation observations before discussing the process as a group. The journals were taken home by students for reflection.

In the third and final session students explored the concepts of degradation with their final pieces with a group discussion on material lifecycle. Our aim of this conversation was to increase awareness of the material lifespans and circularity.