The Fabrication Commons:
Creative Agency Through Intuitive Interfaces, Part 1.
An M.Arch Thesis by Aleks Gontarz
For as long as I can remember, the act of making things has been incredibly important to me. The process of taking an initial idea and developing it into a final product was not only extremely gratifying, but educational in a way that didn’t feel imposed. It felt like materializing exactly what I wanted from thin air through my force of will. I wondered why everyone else around me wasn’t constantly creating new things. I often got the same answer: “Why would I spend all of this effort, when I can just buy it cheaper?”. Modern urban dwellers prefer to be consumers of mass produced physical goods, leaving the messy production hidden out of sight. This might explain the frustrations I felt while making — when I didn’t have the right space, or the right tools, or someone to teach me how to do something.
With production and consumption so separated, making seems to be much less culturally important these days. This takes away resources and opportunities to engage people that might benefit as I did from making something themselves. I believe that modern fabrication and networking technologies can bring back craft to mainstream culture; and that as a designer, I can create interfaces and tools and contribute to engaging non-experts with making to bring about this cultural shift.
Abstract
With digital fabrication tools and networking technology becoming increasingly attainable and versatile, there is an opportunity for more people to become makers instead of just being passive consumers. How can we take advantage of this to foster larger local and global communities of makers? Most digital fabrication research focuses on a singular novel process or application of a tool, and not the actual relationship between the users and the entire fabrication process. To engage a broader audience with digital fabrication, I propose a user-centric ecosystem that attempts to seamlessly link all of the individual elements of the workflow. My research involves designing a series of prototypes for inexperienced makers that lower the barriers of complex workflows. By doing this, anyone can be empowered to shape their environment and cater to their needs and desires without relying on mass-produced goods. With more engaging, accessible methods of fabrication, people can benefit from the advantages of creating something themselves, and form communities that are more empowered and meaningfully connected.
Chapter 1: The Importance of Making
Physically creating something is an important part of the human experience. Before the era of large manufacturing industries, people created many of the things that surrounded them for themselves, their families, or, if they happened to be specialized craftspeople, their local communities. People were both producers and consumers operating at a very local scale. They were also working together towards a common goal, exchanging information, developing skills, creating social connections, and creating a unique character for the community. These benefits still apply today. Studies show that physically creating something can be beneficial not only to interpersonal relationships, but personal mental and physical well-being. (Collier and Wayment, 2017)
In his book, “The Alphabet and the Algorithm”, Mario Carpo clearly outlines how much modern digital fabrication has in common with pre-industrial craft:
“As advanced cad-cam systems already support and, indeed, encourage cooperation and interaction among human actors and technical networks in all stages of design and production, the end result of full, digitally supported notationality in architecture may also reenact some of the original, ancestral, and autographic aspects of artisanal hand-making.”
— Mario Carpo, 2011 (The Alphabet and the Algorithm, pg 92)
Modern Mass-Produced Manufacturing
Today’s economic model, along with technology and globalization, streamlines the production of goods into complex, vertically integrated manufacturing chains. This brings large volumes of inexpensive products to consumers, but at the cost of choice and variety (Alptekinoğlu and Corbett, 2008). People are also less involved and less aware about how the products they consume come into existence, making it harder to appreciate its value. With manufacturing facilities moving away from urban centres, urban dwellers have little choice but to be nothing more than consumers (Gornig and Goebel, 2016).
The economic model of modern capitalism inevitably creates an imbalanced power dynamic between the producer and consumer. Since profit is usually the driving factor of any decisions of a large business, the attitude towards the consumer can be of indifference or even outright oppression. This becomes more apparent as the market share of a company increases towards a total monopoly. One of the ways that the consumer is brushed aside is the lack of choice and variety. A one-size-fits-all model necessarily caters to a majority, and often ignores a wide variety of differences in ability, culture, religion, even personal preference. The first industrial revolution brought unprecedented output but also homogenization and sameness. Made-to-order, bespoke fabrication became less and less economically feasible as these vertical manufacturing processes grew.
The newest step in the evolution of industry is being called Industry 4.0 (Lasi et al.). The first three are optimizations to the idea of mass production and vertically integrating systems, but Industry 4.0 provides a distinct disruption in the form of both mass customization using digital fabrication tools, and an unprecedented exchange of information. Both of these qualities lend itself to the possibility of successfully decentralizing fabrication. The impact of economy of scale is becoming smaller and smaller. A democratic mode of making as described in the following quote, finally seems feasible.
“Today we are immersed in forces and ideas that hinder the fulfillment of human purposes; large corporations standardize and limit our choice; philosophies of behaviorism condition people to deny their potential freedom; “modern architecture” becomes the convention for “good taste” and an excuse to deny the plurality of actual needs. But a new mode of direct action is emerging, the rebirth of a democratic mode and style, where everyone can create his personal environment out of impersonal subsystems, whether they are new or old, modern or antique. By realizing his immediate needs, by combining ad hoc parts, the individual creates, sustains and transcends himself. Shaping the local environment towards desired ends is a key to mental health; the present environment, blank and unresponsive, is a key to idiocy and brainwashing.”
— Charles Jencks 1972, (Adhocism, pg 15)
Empowerment through Local Digital Fabrication
How does a world look like where this “plurality of actual needs” is realized? Many digital fabrication projects give us an insight into what happens when an individual or a community is empowered to make whatever they need, whenever they need it. The following are examples where empowering people to create with digital fabrication tools has a positive impact.
The IKEA ThisAbles project (thisables.com) is a series of hacks that will make some standard IKEA furniture more accessible for people with special needs. The designs are free to download and print for anyone. Some of these designs include a larger handle that allows for opening with a forearm, and a bumper that protects glass furniture from collision. Mass producing these would not be feasible for adapting to every users needs.
Studio Bark shared their designs with the protest group Extinction Rebellion (studiobark.co.uk/a-hopeful-revolution), a modular box that can be fabricated with a CNC machine (Jessel, 2019). During a protest, the boxes can be easily assembled into structures to occupy a space, becoming difficult to dismantle. This is a great example of sharing designs and empowering a group in a way that would be difficult otherwise, because the anti-institutional implications of the design would make traditional manufacturing companies reluctant to create and sell a product such as this.
Maker Culture
In urban environments, the informational act of design and physical act of production are largely separated. However, many people are trying to bring about spaces where both can happen in the form of makerspaces, hackerspaces, or fabrication labs. One of the earliest examples of a makerspace is the MIT Fab Lab, established in 2001 by Neil Gershenfeld. He saw the potential of small-scale digital fabrication, and the importance of being involved in both the informational and physical aspects of creation. He believed that these skills and resources should be available to anyone: from artists, students, engineers, to small businesses (Gershenfeld 2007). In recent years, the growth of the maker movement and further affordability of tools led to the establishment of these in places such as libraries and community centres, or even dedicated buildings. However, these spaces focus heavily on the education aspect, or expect that the user already has a high proficiency without much guidance.
Two examples of successful makerspaces are The Shop in Toronto (theshoptoronto.ca) and NYSCI in New York (nycsci.org). The Shop is an analog DIY space that focuses on ceramics and woodworking. The New York Hall of Science focuses on educating children and engaging them in STEAM activities (science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics). However, even the most successful spaces suffer from a lack of internal exchange of information, as well as outreach to the surrounding neighbourhood, communicating the value of the space, and adapting to the needs of the community.
State of the Art
Much digital fabrication research focuses on the complexity of the final product. Some researchers, like the studio Atonaton, studies the relationship between human and machine (atonaton.com/mimus). There are few projects that focus on both the interaction between the user and the machine, and the final fabricated product. It is crucial to examine both, because the strength of digital fabrication is adapting to each users’ needs, and this can only be done successfully if those needs are communicated adequately. One project that does this well is the Hive pavilion by Autodesk (autodesk.com/research/projects/hive). This structure is a complex form created by inexperienced users working with collaborative robots towards a common goal. It is important not only to examine how this interaction affects the final product, but to communicate the value of using these machines to prospective new makers.
“The challenge isn’t, at all, to propose the deployment of new fabrication technologies, but to deploy them in modes, configurations and assemblages that might effectively resist capture by existing logics of accumulation and exploitation, and bind them into processes that are generative of lasting and significant shared value. Those interested in seeing digital fabrication used as part of a project of radical transformation will need to invest a great deal of effort into ensuring that the way in which one would go about using it is actively invitational, not merely demystified and formally accessible.”
— Adam Greenfield, 2017 (Radical Technologies, pg 98)
Chapter 2: An Ecosystem for Making
We can foster larger communities of makers by designing an engaging, interconnected, decentralized ecosystem for making. I propose a model that can be used as a guide to successfully deploy these new technologies. They must go beyond being formally available, to being a catalyst for education, innovation and social connection. This ecosystem, called the Fabrication Commons considers the users as central actors, and their relationship to the elements needed for fabrication: space, materials, physical tools, design tools, systems, and knowledge. Finally, the interface layer (in orange) examines the relationship between these elements, and aims to remove any barriers or resistance between them, so that information and resources can flow freely. The name “Fabrication Commons” is taken from a broader ideology of the Collaborative Commons and applies it to local manufacturing. This is essentially the sharing spirit of the maker movement as an alternative economic model:
The democratization of innovation and creativity on the emerging
Collaborative Commons is spawning a new kind of incentive, based less on the expectation of financial reward and more on the desire to advance the social well-being of humanity. And it’s succeeding.— Jeremy Rifkin, 2014 (The Zero Marginal Cost Society, pg 34)
USERS
The human actors in the ecosystem. Each one has different desires, skills, knowledge. It is important to facilitate interaction between users and the other elements, but equally important to facilitate user-user interactions.
SPACE
The physical space required for learning, designing, making, storing, collaborating, and socializing.
MATERIALS
The raw matter, parts, components, or assemblies that are consumed to form the end product.
PHYSICAL TOOLS
A device or implement used to carry out a particular function, like modifying a material
DESIGN TOOLS
Used to plan the qualities, function, and assembly process of a finished product before it is realized — usually a digital tool
SYSTEMS
Groups of items which are organized in a way that aids users reach their desired goal. These can include: toolkits, modules, design libraries, open-ended parametric designs.
KNOWLEDGE
Facts, information, skills, an understanding of a subject. Can be passed from person to person, or stored and recalled from books, devices, or networks.
INTERFACE
A shared boundary where two distinct parts of a system meet and can exchange information. The unifier of all previous elements.
Part 2 of this thesis examines how these individual elements can overlap and connect through six interface tool prototypes.
Continue to Part 2 >>>
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