Lab Journal (UN Trip)

We had a field trip to the United Nations headquarter to listen to speeches given by speakers such as Joel Towers, who is a Dutch Ambassador and here to give speeches on Sustainable Dutch Designs. Some of the characteristics of Dutch Design are that they are minimalistic, innovative and experimental. Personally, I’m not a big fan of Dutch Design as it doesn’t always look that aesthetically pleasing to me. On the other hand, the most memorable talk to me was the one given by an Indian girl who used dance moves to embody the status of global warming. I never thought that you could use our own body to translate climatic phenomenon before seeing her dance. I really liked this innovative idea because if we think closely, our body is very closely linked to nature. We drink and eat from resources provided by nature and we will eventually biodegrade like other objects after we pass away and become a part of this land that provides nutritions and other resources to other animals and humans.

Lab Journal(Sustainable Design and LCA)

This is the basic concept of a product life cycle, everything that we produce is inseparable from the diagram above. Everything on this planet will obsolete one day, it just depends on the life span that the manufacturer and designer decided to give to the product. It ranges from just a few seconds to many years. In order to increase profit, the idea of planned obsolescence is introduced. I completely understand the purpose of this action, however I am against this action because it not only takes advantages of customers, it also harms our environment as planned obsolescence helps to produce more trash. We are already running out of land to store our trash, this only worsen the problem. Also, sometimes the product might contains poisonous elements, if these poison stuffs leaks to rivers, it will pollute the water and make animals and people sick if they drink it and possibly creates waterborne diseases. In addition, planned obsolescence means constant replacement of products, which means factories need to manufactures more than before, which damages our environment as it increases deforestation and extraction of natural materials, which will have great impacts on our environment. I really think companies and designers need to be more ethical when they design and produce products, it will help them to have better brand image and raise their reputation as well, so why not?

 

Lab Journal (Climate Change and Cities)

Reflection

Rapid urbanization is negatively impacting our environment, the pollution produced from urbanization causes climate change, in which could lead to severe issues such as rising sea levels, but the good thing is more and more people are aware of how terrible our environment is right now. Individuals decided to move to nearby urban areas to seek job opportunities that could improve their lifestyle and living conditions for themselves and their offsprings as urban areas tend to have better education systems. However, rapid urbanization could make a place overcrowded, everything will be more competitive and the lack of available space forces organizations to develop more lands which then will lead to loss of habitat and natural resources.

Personally, as a person who grew up in a city (Beijing and Hong Kong), I witnessed a lot of social and environmental changes caused by urbanization. Beijing, being the Capital of China, is a ‘dream comes true’ place for many individuals from undeveloped areas in China as they think that big cities like Beijing will have a lot of job opportunities. Therefore, most of them migrated to the city causing Beijing becoming overcrowded and needs to constantly develop new areas to fit all of these people. Also, the non-locals and their children are competing with locals for education and jobs, and have greater chance to lose their jobs, forcing many locals to immigrate to other places. Overcrowding led to sanitation issues, with my experience, the streets in Beijing are getting dirtier because it is harder for the government to control and these non-locals are not that well educated, which means they would throw rubbish wherever they want. On the environmental side, urbanization did made many people wealthier and made them own at least one car, the air quality has decreased dramatically due to the carbon emissions from vehicles. Carbon is one of the greenhouse gases that helps forming global warming. In addition, expansion of lands cannot be done without deforestation, which means that the natural habitat are being disrupted, e.g. water source, forcing many wild animals to ‘migrate’ or become extinct as they cannot find food source anymore.

I feel like urbanization is like fashion trends, there is a cycle to it, e.g. building sustainable environment –>creating opportunies–> people move in–> overcrowded–> becomes not as good as it used to be–> people move out–> redevelops. 

Lab Journal (Mycelium “Mushroom” Kit)

 

Result

The mycelium turned white after day 7, which means it successfully absorbed the flour mixture and was ready to be used. However, only the outer part of the mycelium turned white, the mixture didn’t really change on the inner part. In addition, the mixture became a solid and it was really hard to break it apart. I tried to crumble them up so that I could begin making the product that was on my mind but the entire thing was too dry, which it couldn’t hold the shapes that I was trying to form.

Reflection

I was quite disappointed with the result as I was unable to make anything from the mycelium. As for the reason, I think it was mainly because my kit was overexposed to sunlight, making it drying faster than expected. If I have the chance to regrow some mycelium, I would place it somewhere that has access to both sunlight and moisture. After researching about mycelium, I found out that this particular material is strong and fire resistant, therefore I began to think about other ways to use this material instead of using it in packaging. In order to produce products that could be use for a long time or even permanently, I started questioning how long will it take for mycelium to decay? the lifespan of mycelium? I think its fire resistant characteristic opened up more opportunities for it, maybe it could be incorporated into a house someday.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Drug Rehabilitation System 

The system that I would like to explore throughout this semester is the drug rehabilitation in New York City. Although I visited NYC several times before I came study at Parsons, I never really paid attention to its culture and the surrounding environment. As a tourist, I only paid attention to how busy and dirty the city is but never really thought what caused this. After school started and living in the city, I could often smell a very strange and horrible smell on the streets or even down the hallways of my dorm and I was informed that it’s the smell of weed, which is a type of drug. However, there are many programs out there for drug addicts who seeks for a change. Therefore, drug rehabilitation has become a growing business or systems in New York City. I was intrigued by this system because weed usage is such a common thing in New York City, I believe everyone in the city is affect by weed through different levels, either they do weed or they could smell it because the is spread by air. I wondered how could rehab centers help these drug addicts and affect other people less. There are many reasons why people smoke weed, an example would be peer pressure. There is no age limits for doing drugs, the person could be a teenager or an elderly.

After doing some research about drug rehabilitation, I found out that there are three types of rehab centers, which are private, non-profit and government ones. I began to wonder which type is the most efficient and does it has anything to do with wealth e.g. wealthier people go to private center whereas poorer people go to non-profit ones? Also, I would like to find out whether or not rehab centers will actually help a person to stay sober and how do they help out these patients.

Itinerary:

To make my research more informative, I visited two rehab centers.

Map of the rehab centers:

Both centers are located within a building, I was only allowed to have access to the lobby of the building because I was informed that I needed to schedule an appointment beforehand. It seems like they both have very good security systems. However, I was able to go up to the actual center for the Hazelden one because I bumped into one of the doctors there while I was at the lobby so he took me up after I told him that I am a student who is doing a research about drug rehabilitation.

 

Road Recovery:

Road recovery is located in the basement of the building it’s in, I couldn’t go down so I don’t know how the inside looks. The surrounding area is quite isolated, although it is located on the 41st street, which is not that far, it was very obvious that there are less people, especially tourists and people who work in an office. It is right next to a highway, and there are a lot of shuttle buses going around. There are less asians in that area, it’s like a place you wouldn’t go unless there is a purpose to go there. The building lobby is very clean and there is a couch for people to rest and wait. There wasn’t a security for this rehab center, but at the lobby there is a reception desk for all the organizations and residents inside. 

Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation:

This rehab center is located very near FIT (Fashion Institute of Technology), therefore there were much more people, and the place seems a lot busier that Road Recovery. There is a security in the lobby who controls the people who goes in and out the building for safety. The security was very nice, he asked on of the doctors who happened to walk pass to take me upstairs to the center (Usually need to book an appointment beforehand to get in). This place is more organized because there is a line for visitors to register themselves before entering in the actual building at lobby.

Everything about it is very different from my impressions of rehab centers, this place seems more like a private clinic to me. It is small scaled and the place looks more friendly than I thought. I thought that rehab centers would look very dark and ‘cold’ but this place gives a sense of belonging as a result of the arrangement of its furniture and the color of light they use.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Reflection on looking for absence of structure

This mini assignment requires us to walk around with a partner within a designated area and search for either absence of structure or structure in New York City. My partner and I were assigned to look for absence of structure, and we walked around the university center from 12th street to 14th street to look for them.

Before my partner and I went out and complete this exercise, I had the perception that there would barely be any absence of structure within New York City and thought it would be easier if the task is structure since structures are very obvious to eyes and absence of structure is more ‘invisible, which means you really need to search for it. However, I was completely wrong as I was not being open-minded enough before I started doing this exercise. Absence of structure could literally be anything that disrupt a structure and make things look less organized. Although there were a lot of absence of structure on the street already, such as the sidewalk was missing some stones so it becomes a danger to people as they might stumble on the missing areas of the sidewalk, my partner and I decided to go into stores and supermarkets to for more absence of structure. We found so much within 3 minutes after we went into a small local supermarket, for example the vegetables weren’t lined up properly or there are gaps between them as somebody took one of the vegetables.

This activity is like a scavenger hunt, I was so glad that we have outdoor activities rather than just sitting inside the classroom and researching about absence of structure in New York City online. I preferred seeing and feeling things myself,  therefore I really enjoyed this activity, I thought it was very interesting to do.

Surveillance Selfie

This was a very interesting starter for this class as this course is all about systems and strategies within New York City. Systems is mainly categorized into four different groups such as human system, information and transportation system, natural system and invisible system. During our first studio class,we were looking at cctv cameras within the city and  how they are ‘spying’ on us 24/7. We are so used to this surveillance, therefore we don’t really care and never pay attention to these cctv cameras.

For this exercise, we were asked to go under a particular cctv camera, in this case, we went to the one located on 14 street 6 avenue and took a selfie there.  We each had a partner, and we stood in front of each other.

 

Project 2: mood board and sketches

Moodboard:

For project 2, I thought that I could try to use recycled materials such as cans and water bottles that already have prints on them to refer to the idea of graffiti because I believe that each words that the corporate used has its own meaning. For example, nutrition facts gives people a general idea of the calories and sugar that the product, which helps people to take care of their health. I also included pictures of post-it notes that were put on the walls during the Umbrella Revolution as I was intrigued by how these exact same object could form interesting patterns when they are layered together randomly. For the color, I decided to go with vibrant colors to symbolize youth as this was a political activity that was mainly led by a group of university students, resisting to be controlled and changed by the Hong Kong and mainland government. I want to use these vibrant colors to emphasize the passion that these students have in fighting for their rights and better future.

 

Sketches:

 

 

ASSIGNMENT #16- Mass & materials Interlocking

 

The purpose of this assignment was to create a 3D solid cube that shows mass. Immediately, I thought I could use materials with various mass to show this. The materials that I chose at first were wood and foam core, I was aware of the thickness of foam core and thought that it would be interesting if I layer foam cores together to create a mass that I want instead of just cutting off a cube from the wood.

For some parts, I combined wood and foam core together so that the shape would fit. I decided to to add pink foam into this assignment too to add a hint of color so that it would look more aesthetically pleasing.

 

Assignment #14 : Polyhedron

 

For this assignment, we were asked to produce a polyhedron using the laser cutting technique.  I chose to use two different colors plexiglass because the pattern I etched on the surface is a fire emoji since I was inspired by a candle holder.

My inspiration:

 

My drawing on laser cutter

 

 

Final Work

I wasn’t very satisfied with this because I didn’t measure it correctly so the top of the design did not fit.