Dress Codes:
work environments – wearables –
protective wear
Prof. Jacqueline C.M. Otten.
Design Department, University of Applied Sciences,
Hamburg, Germany.
e-mail: j_otten@web.de
Abstract
In the age of digitalisation, knowledge and resources
are stored in computers and available to anyone at any time, and workday
rhythms as well as our work and leisure schedules have changed. But the effects
of the digitalisation go far beyond just the modification of our workday.
Significant social effects and the impact on the design of body environments –
let it be fashion or the work space - are interacting with this changing
society.
Yet, looking at the trends, discernable in interior and
fashion design, we see a mixture of 50’s futurism and 70’s plastic flower
power, with a dash of the 60’s for the “Average Consumer”.
It seems a contradiction: we live in an era where
digital appliances and equipment dominate home interiors and the workplace, but
our design reality obviously comes to be through the reproduction of the past.
In designing new utilitarian articles, we connect current
thinking and culture with earlier generations of thinking and designing. Yet,
the “digital way of life” is not merely restricted to the visual, but
incorporates relationships of experiences. In this post-material cult of the
“real self”, design focuses on two interfering phenomena: the multitude of real
or visionary environments and trends touching the notion that the traditional
formal and physical design has to be extended.
This
paper deals with the question of materiality and virtuality.
By
going back in time in a first step, I come to the roots of use and application.
To explain the false materiality of things as a vehicle brings us to the “post
material cult of the real self” of designs. Examples of developments throughout
the ages - interior design and fashion design – underline the thesis of a new
dress code.
During the renovation of
its main building, Weimar's Bauhaus University decided to restore Gropius’ Director’s
Room as a usable working room. The Director’s Room only existed at its original
location during the period between the great Bauhaus exhibition in the summer
of 1923 and the departure of the Staatliches Bauhaus's teachers and students in
April, 1925. Subsequently, the furnishings were removed with the furniture
going along with the Bauhaus to Dessau.
In the art historical
sense, this room represents an important achievement of Weimar's Bauhaus period
since the room presents a new kind of what the Germans call “Gesamtkunstwerk”:
a complete work of art.
The
ideology of this modern architecture had a rather paradox character. It was
created from a striving for the essential, with no aesthetic references to the
past, though still giving the impression of being intentionally “stylish”.
In
his book “From Bauhaus to our house” Tom Wolfe points out the crucial problem of this ideology [1]. The first Bauhaus postulate, being
“non-bourgeois” can hardly be maintained in daily life. People tend to
“personalize” space, as seen in the Gropius room as it was in its original
state: with the table cloth and cushions.
This
aspect is important when creating visions that have to be translated into the
“now”. Then, talking about vision and reality, the first question is how many
utopias have in fact become a reality. And for those that did, when did they become a reality?
A
vision is not yet understood machinery, a desire. Tracing the roots of
technology, it is useful to regard the Kapp theory in „Philosophie der Technik“
from 1877 [2]. Kapp states that every tool is an organ projection. Tools
produce new tools and those tools include a projection that man cannot define
any more. It is what Kapp and Freud call the „unconscious“. This „unconscious“
should be understood as „not yet understood machinery“. Freud adds that the
fulfilment of this desire to perfection makes man to a prosthesis god, but that
at the same time man has problems with those artificial organs.
Examples
from the year 1883 show, that the design of those tools is touched by the fact
that, in daily life, we attempt to adjust our environment to our needs and
desires, but cognitively we adjust our expectations in order to orient
ourselves in our world and survive in daily life.
This
adjustment in two directions acts when designing new utilitarian articles. We connect current thinking and culture with
earlier generations of thinking and designing.
The same development can
be seen in the world of wearable computers.
Perhaps wearable
computers are not as ground-breaking a technology as is commonly supposed.
History gives us examples of a technology that evolved physically from immobile
to portable to wearable, that employed a variety of user interfaces, and that
revolutionized cultural conceptions.
An example for this is
the „Berlin Golden Hat“. A prehistoric hat, used for ceremonies, manufactured
by a blacksmith in the period of the „urn fields“, (die Urnenfelderkultur)
between 1300 and 800 b.C. It measures about 75 centimetres, decorated with
suns, moons and stars. The shape reminds us of a real wizard’s hat as we know
it from fairytales and Harry Potter. It had a strap for the chin – and even
textiles: with lining inside, as experts found out.
The symbols on this hat
were used as a logarithmic table to calculate the lunar solaric calendar. The
Berlin Museum Director Wilfried Menghin said about this hat, that „..Who owned
the hat and who knew how to decode the symbols, controlled time and was the
leader of the cult community“.
It is indeed about the
decoding and cult community. Modern
wearables are tools, but define themselves less as “solid objects” because they
embody the virtual. So we should regard them more involved in actions or
processes.
The
wearable community is the visualization of the relationship that man has to his
tools. In spite of Steve Man’s intention to create wearables that are, as he
mentioned it “less off-putting to others”, it is not taken into account that
wearables have to have a certain aesthetic value. The designs the Wearable Community
works with are mock-ups of the technically possible, but in no way intend to be
trend oriented accessories that the end users want them to be.
2.
Plug & Play
So we have a false materiality as a starting position,
and as a next step in development we might have a situation of surrealism: the
negation of the actual function, converting to the
non-identity. One could say that this is “surrealistic” and I would like to call it the
“Nintendo Effect”. This is based on the idea of modules in the broadest sense
of the word. Utilities become temporary und multi functional. The product that
is used for “Plug and Play” is only a reference to
itself - the mobile phone is the clearest
example of this process.
Much
of our technology was intended multi-functional in their start. The earliest
watches date from about 1500-1520 and were worn around the neck. These were
called “musk-ball watches,” after the spherical metal perfume containers that
early watchmakers fit the clockworks into.
Multi functionality is
the dynamic process of conversion and adaption of fashion and technology. “Plug and Play” carries out the principle.
Combining as you wish leads to multiple identities of designs. But how
it is combined, is often a question of secret codes - only who knows how
to decode the symbols, controls and is the leader of the cult community“.
The
multi functionality of design objects turns them into modules, and Plug and
Play refers to the individual in this context.
The
Italian couple Rivetti founded CP-Company. They create waterproof capes that
can become tents kites or hammocks, jerkins that can become armchairs. The
transformables open the way to a new type of accessory for life in the
metropolis. These are not just clothes, they are spatial extensions of the
human body, prostheses (which again refers to the Kapp theory about organ
projections), that enhance the ability to survive outside the tribe and the
herd.
Then,
obviously our society needs life support systems, existential equipment for
endless voyages.
3.
Protective Wear
Jeremy Rifkin describes
that information technology „has the potential to release and destabilize
civilisation“ [3].
The Camera Performances
of Steve Mann demonstrate the other aspect of wearables being a social
phenomenon: they are, beyond the available fashion language, a social
borderline experience in that they regulate expressiveness and define new
conventions. In his work he points out that the right of freedom of information
and of expressing oneself in public requires one to be very critical with the
so-called „freedom of expression ".
Steve Mann’s statement:
“Much of my passion has been fuelled by a desire to restore some balance of
privacy in a world where individuals are increasingly affronted by government
surveillance and corporate encroachments” [4].
Not to be seen, and
refusing to be identified in public places and the protection of the individual
are the goals of Vexed Fashion. Their design is based on the principle
"protection against unwanted intrusion" and a good example of how fashion
trends and social trends interact. Vexed extends the traditional formal and
physical design of fashion. They move forward to a world where the interchange
of information is one of the driving forces, and fashion becomes
concept-oriented.
With view on the recent
developments on security (passports with biometric data, surveillance cameras
in public space) this topic will further on be a main theme in design.
4. The post material
cult of the real self
With a digital reality,
the distinction between real and unreal vanishes and it leaves us with products
that have multiple or uncertain identities. Interiors in the digital way of
life are not merely restricted to the visual. They incorporate relationships of
experiences. And this is what I would like to
call “The post-material cult of the real self of designs”.
Rooms interact and melt
with bodies: the shell becomes the supporting element in managing every day
life, nomadism becomes the norm.
The
“post-material cult of the real self” is evident in fashion and interior
design: everything is temporary or preliminary, no preferences or decision on
taste identifies the “ich” or “I”.
Fashion underlines this
trend. The designer Chalayan defines „wearable for daily life“ or „a wearable“
as something that allows for the exchange between the immediate environment and
the body. Essential in the work of creators
like Issey Miyake or Chalayan is the heuristic element in design, to create
behavioural patterns and even “design” a spirit, rather than just dealing with
the physical world. In the A-poc (a piece of cloth) project, Miyake produces
rolls of fabric that hold complete clothing ensembles, including a wallet, a
bag and a hat [5].
But
the design process in those pieces is not finished yet. This multi-optional
collection only finds its final shape when it meets the future wearer. This
person has to take over responsibility, which means he or she has to decide
what will be cut out.
These
pieces of work constantly recreate the foundations of design. They visualize
the fundamental changes in our society and offer innovative solutions with
aesthetic power – and it is noticeable, that the above mentioned designs are
created for the digital society, without having the slightest touch of computer
technology in them.
Also
the new work places symbolize the transition from an organic, industrial society to a polymorph information
system. As a first step, this system has no shape, but just a function.
After the false
materiality through the negation of the function we are coming to a certain
post materiality, e.g. blue tooth. Data transportation systems have no body,
they have a function. Only the additional embodiment will give it an identity,
so we deal with a new physical reality and a new physical appearance. And this
might include less „hardware“, because it is concentrating on conducting
processes. As a result of true innovation, these designs have an inner logic.
Last but not least, it
is all about acceptance and that has to do with culture.
Spiritual and bodily
openness has changed considerably during the last years [6].We now deal with a new acoustics a new visuality, a
different psychological and reduced aesthetical need for keeping one’s
distance. Having continual access to communication systems means we are
multitasking, even while having a face-to-face conversation. Users develop new
forms of social behaviour that, to outsiders, may seem strange or even rude.
In the end, it are
social-political conventions that determine use, form and size of tools and
environments. An interesting analogue example of size and miniaturization is
that watches became bigger when they became more accurate. Not because the
improved mechanisms were more difficult to fabricate, but because of the desire
of “being seen”. The form is also determined by the function in a social
context.
Yes, the globalisation
has changed public perceptions – on one hand. But a necessary prerequisite for
innovative spaces is that culture and technology become compatible and this is
a regional question. Cultural influences determine the logic of action,
producing standardized systems will not be enough for getting them to function
or for solving problems.
References
[1]
Wolfe, T., From Bauhaus to our house, Bantam, 1999
[2] Kapp, Grundlinien einer Philosophie
der Technik. Zur Entstehungsgeschichte der Cultur aus neuen Gesichtspunkten, Braunschweig 1877
[3]
Rifkin, J., The end of work: The Decline
of the Global Labor Force and the Dawn of the Post-Market Era. New York,
1995
[4]
Mann, S. "Cyborg seeks Community" in www.wearcam.org/shootingback
[5] Vitra Design Museum A-poc
making, Weil am Rhein, 2001
[6]
Sennett, R., The Fall of Public Man, Alfred
A. Knopf, Inc., New York, 1976