ABSTRACT

This paper questions design priorities in computational systems and proposes that social aspects of material practice are overlooked in existing computational design practices. An interactive fabrication system designed for this project: Digital Tufting Bee centres on machine tufting, an adaptation of the handcrafting technique for making voluminous folds of yarn. The word ‘Bee’ refers to a quilting tradition in which a group comes together to quilt; I use this term to emphasize communal effort, shared decision-making and collective meaning-making in computational design processes. Building on literature in Science and Technology Studies, I argue that collective material practice and social play deepen human engagement in making processes and further challenge existing orders of computational design processes. By collecting and analysing qualitative data from three tufting workshops, I observed that uncertainties of yarn, conversation during making, tendencies to leave space for others, and exchange of crafting skills brought valuable meaning to interactive tufting. This paper concludes that as long as researchers involve communal aspects of making to connect makers, tools, materials and their communities, computational making could challenge the dominant design paradigm. Based on these findings, promising areas of further study include rituals of gift giving and collective textile repair in material practices.

摘要

本文质疑计算系统中的设计优先事项，并提出现有计算设计实践中忽视了材料实践的社会方面。为本项目设计的交互式制造系统：Digital Tufting Bee以机器簇绒为中心，这是一种手工技术的改进，用于制作大量纱线褶皱。“蜜蜂”一词指的是一种缝制传统，即一群人聚集在一起缝制被子。我用这个术语来强调计算设计过程中的共同努力、共同决策和集体意义制定。基于科学技术研究文献，我认为集体物质实践和社会游戏加深了人类对制造过程的参与，并进一步挑战计算设计过程的现有秩序。通过收集和分析三个簇绒车间的定性数据，我观察到纱线的不确定性、制作过程中的对话、为他人留出空间的倾向以及工艺技能的交流为互动簇绒带来了宝贵的意义。本文的结论是，只要研究人员涉及制作的公共方面来连接制造商、工具、材料及其社区，计算制作就可以挑战主导的设计范式。基于这些发现，有前途的进一步研究领域包括礼物赠送仪式和材料实践中的集体纺织品修复。