Designing Matter 2: From Tile to Tessellation

The MoA Design Research Studio »Designing Matter 2« investigated tessellated surfaces as material systems for textile architecture and product design. A tessellated surface is composed of individual units—tiles—which are connected by a joining material — such as tissue. Designing the materiality and the geometry of these individual units and their joints allows to calibrate the functionality of the overall tessellation. Designing matter as an overarching concept denotes the definition of the form and the materiality of the component elements in a material in order achieve a specific functionality. This process allows to utilize and enhance the inherent properties of a given material and ultimately to generate novel ones. Codes — either analogue or digital — are used to implement the design of the material by means of a systematization of its form-function interrelationship.

Tesselated material systems allow for a high degree of differentiation through the process of defining the individual component tiles. This leads to finely tuned behaviour of the resulting surface responding to a set of influencing factors such as structural loads or climatic influences. Furthermore, this adaptive behaviour can change over time since units can be added to or changed within a tessellated material systems. Applications range from enclosures on an architectural scale to surface definitions in product design.

The MoA Design Research Studio »Designing Matter 2« was structured in three distinct phases building towards a thesis in either textile architectural or product design and an overarching phase X on writing, documenting and archiving. In phase 1 tesselations in biology were introduced as role models for design. In phase 2 fabrication techniques for tessellated material systems were explored. In phase 3 application scenarios for these systems were introduced which eventually led to the formulation of individual or joint thesis projects.

Responsible Persons and Contributors

weißensee school of art and design berlin, Matters of Activity, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Professor Dr.-Ing. Karola Dierichs
Jessica Farmer, BA
Felix Rasehorn, MA
Dr. Mareike Stoll

weißensee school of art and design berlin
Elaine Bonavia, MSc

Max Planck Institute of Colloids and Interfaces, Matters of Activity, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Professor Dr. Mason Dean
Dr. Michaela Eder
Johanna Hehemeyer-Cürten, MA
Charlett Wenig, MA
Binru Yang, MSc

Matters of Activity, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Professor Dr. John Nyakatura

Guest Reviewer
Professor Dr. Dr.hc. Peter Fratzl

Students, BA Textile- and Surface Design
Eva Bullermann, Jola Hauschild, Jula Herold, Lilo Ming Kiefer, Jieun Lee, Clara Poeverlein, Franziska Siebenhaar, Felipe Silva, Naja Stelmach, Sophie Stöckemann, Sahaj Ketrapal, Leila Wallisser