Living Structures: Design with Bacteria and Textiles
Project information
submitted by
Charlett Wenig
Mentors
Charlett Wenig
Faculty:
Art and Design
Degree programme:
Product Design (Bachelor of Arts (B.A.))
Type of project presentation
Exhibition
Semester
Summer semester 2026
- Geschwister-Scholl-Straße 7 - Van-de-Velde-Bau
Available during summaery's regular opening hours
Contributors:
Max-Planck-Institut für Kolloid- und Grenzflächenforschung, ioviso GmbH
Project description
What happens when materials are not only formed, but grow, react, and change themselves? In the course Living Structures: Design with Bacteria and Textiles, students explored how soft textile systems can be transformed into rigid structures through biological and mineral processes.
The starting point was research into microorganisms that mineralize materials and thereby turn flexible textiles into solid forms. Working at the intersection of material experiment, laboratory visits, and »hard science-fiction design,« students developed their own material analogies to make processes visible that today still take place in the lab.
Scientific methods were translated into design concepts: textile samples were analyzed, material properties tested, and possible applications for living, responsive, and self-transforming materials imagined. The resulting works move between product, object, and new manufacturing technologies, offering a glimpse of the futures that might emerge when design works not against, but with biological processes.