Apartment 50 was restored by two enthusiasts, Jean-Marc Drut and Patrick Blauwart, as close as possible to its original condition. Listed as a historical monument, the venue occasionally hosts exhibition projects. World-renowned designers have already exhibited there, such as Jasper Morrison, Ronan & Erwan Bouroullec, Konstantin Grcic and Pierre Charpin. Thus, under the direction of Thilo Alex Brunner, head of the Master Product Design at ECAL, and of ECAL professor Augustin Scott de Martinville, a series of objects was produced over one semester by the Product Design Master students. The project began in September 2014 with a three-day workshop in the Cité Radieuse, allowing students to experience life in the building. Based on their various observations, they created objects to “inhabit” Apartment 50, focusing particularly on the following features:
The specific climate of the apartments:
the fan creates an air flow on the mezzanine and the cushions are designed to fit both on the living room’s indoor parapets and on the loggias’ tables.
The flexibility of interior spaces:
the large rotating lamp serves to light either the dining room or the living room in turn, while the small model can be used either on a desk or a bedside table.
Tours of Apartment 50 which take place regularly:
the carpet, crafted with the support of the Ruckstuhl AG manufacture in Langenthal, displays a map showing how the Cité Radieuse blended in with its environment at the time of construction, while the “unit” metre provides a simple tool to explain the Modulor system.
Life in the communal areas, especially the roof terrace which serves as a meeting place:
the chair and folding table are designed to facilitate migration from the living room of the apartment, while the picnic box allows to comfortably carry everything you for an aperitif.
In addition to the projects around the above-mentioned specificities, half a dozen other objects can be discovered on the spot or in the related publication.
In March 2015, the students of the ECAL Master Art Direction were invited to attend a four-day workshop to experience and document everyday life in the building with a view to editing a publication. Through the architectural spectrum across 52 pages, this editorial project includes portraits of residents or fictional characters inspired by the Modulor system, as well as still lifes and original typefaces echoing the building’s proportions.
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MA PRODUCT DESIGN
by Adam Friedrich
Airy is a research project that explores the use of air as a primary resource. It uses inflatable structures to protect valuable devices during travel. The design employs contemporary materials and pays particular attention to detail to offer relevant, everyday solutions for safeguarding increasingly fragile and valuable electronic devices.
MA PRODUCT DESIGN
by Alicia Stricker
Folly approaches the craft of beaded embroidery from a product design perspective. It explores the value of tactility above the visual aspects that the technique is traditionally valued for. Consequently, the project manifested as something that is experienced by the body - a sofa. Scaling up the traditionally small beads and applying principles of beaded embroidery in the development of a textile sofa cover allowed for the sofa to transcend its classic typology, creating a three-dimensional surface with a biological sculptural presence - an object that breaks the mould of what we expect of something as familiar as a sofa and begs to be experienced through touch.
MA PRODUCT DESIGN
by Brice Tempier
Due to limited housing capacity in urban areas, more people are living in small dwellings. At the same time, renting has become a common form of housing in many countries, including among adults. These conditions, sometimes marked by instability, frequent moves, and a feeling of not truly belonging to the place where one lives, led the designer to reflect on our relationship with domestic space, its temporary nature, and the difficulty of making it one’s own. This project takes the form of a small, mobile structure, the size of a bed, conceived as a personal spatial frame within a room. Péninsule is a dense and flexible living space, a micro-architecture open to appropriation.
MA PRODUCT DESIGN
by Carl Johan Jacobsen
In the U.K new court ruling threatens trans-people while the US government is doing a full assault on trans and female bodies. Hardwear is a collection of wearable objects offering a sense of protection in urban environments, as a response to a growing tendency of hostility towards the body. Hard surfaces become flexible armor, protective shields transform into high heels. Whether to preserve personal space on public transport or to create cognitive distance Hardwear aims to create a sense of security. By using hard materials, the feeling of being safe inside a car is transformed to the outside resulting in a line of wearable objects made for for everyday resistance. Drawn on protection typologies from sportswear, Hardwear is made of 100% recycled plastic with 3D printed elements.
MA PRODUCT DESIGN
by Cedric Zimmerman
DUCTUS is investigating how tangential fans can be reinterpreted in combination with spiral ducts, which are normally used in industrial HVAC systems, in a modular, energy-efficient ceiling ventilation system. The galvanised sheet metal is perforated locally using a specially developed laser manufacturing process and then processed into spiral ducts in an industrial standard procedure with almost no material loss. These ducts serve both as air ducts and as a supporting structure for the fan unit. The system, manufactured in collaboration with the Lausanne-based company Air Ventil, generates a wide, quiet air flow while also adding architectural accents.