Six Designs Changing How We Eat, Live and Play

The fashion industry is one of the most polluting in the world, with most of the harm occurring at the finishing and dyeing stages. Eliminating toxic waste and reducing water use are crucial to sustainability, but how can we tackle such a vast and deep-rooted issue?

London based Faber Futures, founded and led by Natsai Audrey Chieza, think they've found a solution. They're exploring a world invisible to the naked eye that we share with trillions of microscopic beings — the world of bacteria.

The team's Project Coelicolor is a suite of dyeing and printing methods with the pigment-producing bacteria Streptomyces coelicolor — known for producing the smell of rain and giving beetroot its flavour.

When grown directly on to textiles, the bacteria generate pigment molecules that attach themselves to fibres. This makes the dyes colour-fast without the need for chemicals, and the whole process uses up to 500 times less water than typical dying methods.

“The pigment molecule is blue but, depending on how you work with it in the lab, it can be purple, pink or red,” explains Chieza. “We then use scientific methods to create growth conditions — programming bacterial to have specific functions.”

While these unique dyeing methods were initially explorative, through years of trial and error, the lab can now design patterns before they grow them.

The next phase is to digitise all of their protocols for more streamlined production, particularly for their collaborators and partners.

Outside of the fashion industry, Project Coelicolor has spurred others to explore bacterial dyes. Biology is now seen not just as a phenomenon to mimic, but as a co-actor to integrate with how we design and innovate, says Chieza.

“We want to encourage [others] to think about how they could do things fundamentally different,” says Chieza. “If we divest from fossil fuels for energy, we’re going to have to divest from fossil fuels for our materials."

Colonising Mars is a hotly contested topic. Many see the interstellar focus as a dangerous distraction from our problems here. Others say it can't be done. And then some believe this exploration could help us design more sustainably here on Earth.

MARSHA is a boundary-pushing design uncovering new methods that could redefine construction as know it. Designed by AI SpaceFactory, it's a 3D-printed vertical home designed for life on the red planet.

The design, recognised by NASA for its ingenuity and feasibility, looks like something plucked off the set of Dune. The four-levelled, egg-shaped structure has a dual-shell specially designed to handle the planet’s extreme temperature swings.

The structure is made from biopolymer —a plastic usually made from vegetable starch— and basalt fibre from the Martian surface. The AI SpaceFactory team proposes that small robots would be sent in advance of human explorers to harvest the local materials for construction.

On the inside, MARSHA is a “little bubble of Earth on Mars,” as AI SpaceFactory Founder, Architect and CEO David Malott puts it. “It’s very human-centric — we’re not designing a bunker, we’re designing a home for astronauts to live in for an extended period.”

MARSHA's unique interior provides all the comforts of home, including sleeping pods and an indoor garden, while "encouraging mobility and averting monotony".

While the question remains if we should even attempt to colonise Mars, the design represents much more than a doomsday contingency plan. “This unique challenge of thinking and developing the technology to build on Mars has the potential to transform the way we build on earth,” says Malott.

To demonstrate the technology behind MARSHA, AI SpaceFactory is building the first habitat on Earth, named TERA, along the Hudson River in Upstate New York. The design may be one small step for humans, but what it represents could be one giant leap for humankind.

The way we feed ourselves today is the very reason why someday we won’t be able to. Our current food production model is unsustainable and accelerating climate change at an unfathomable rate. Even if we shifted the whole globe to renewables, it still wouldn't be enough to counter our consumption.

Finnish company Solar Foods are trying to change these devastating facts by making food out of 'thin air'. Their lab-produced protein, Solein, is made using CO2, electricity and a few tips from mother nature.

Solein is a single-cell protein produced using gas fermentation technology. Naturally occurring organisms are typically grown in a bioreactor using sugars. But to create Solein, the microbes use CO2 as the carbon source and hydrogen as the energy source.

After fermentation, the Solein is then extracted and dried, resulting in a vibrant yellow flour. It's composed of about 50% protein, 20-25% carbohydrates and 5-10% fats.

The unique Solar Foods process is ten times more energy-efficient per hectare than photosynthesis, and 10 to 100 times more climate-friendly and efficient in water use compared to animal or plant-based alternatives.

For Co-Founder and CEO Dr Pasi Vainikka this is the reinvention of a virtually untouched industry: "What we're doing at Solar Foods is completely changing how we generate food and how we can disconnect from the process of agriculture — from the concepts of plants and animals."

As the process is independent of climate needs and requires very few resources, Solein can be produced almost anywhere — from the blistering Sahara Desert to the icy North Pole or even on Mars.

Species accidentally caught while fishing, known as bycatch, are much more than an environmental burden. While new laws can help damaged ecosystems recover, livelihoods often suffer as fishing crews don’t have the technology to fish both sustainably and efficiently.

“It was always in the back of my mind," explained product designer Dan Watson, who's since founded startup SafetyNet Technologies. "This fishing problem wasn’t going to go away."

"Light appeared to be this area that hadn't been explored to its fullest depth," explained Watson. "Different species of fish and crustaceans are affected by lights in different ways. Some are attracted, and some are repelled — it all depends on the type of light you use."

For example, red is good for catching cod and blue for mackerel.

Other experiments also show an increase in yields with a fraction of the time and resources. Static fishing gear becomes more effective, reducing the need for more destructive techniques like trawling, and nets and fishing pots spend much less time in the ocean.

The standardised game controller is based on many assumptions: You have hands, fully functioning thumbs and a fluid range of motion. These assumptions have made the controller unusable for more than one billion people worldwide living with disabilities.

Luckily, Microsoft believes that we all win when everyone can play. That’s why they teamed up with The AbleGamers Charity, The Cerebral Palsy Foundation, SpecialEffect, Warfighter Engaged and the gaming community to design the Xbox Adaptive Controller.

“We’re trying to understand this idea that when we make assumptions about how a product’s going to be used, we could potentially be excluding people,” explains Bryce Johnson, Inclusive Lead at Microsoft.

The Xbox Adaptive Controller enables users to design their own gaming experience from scratch. It functions as a unified hub, where players can connect different devices that correspond to all the Xbox Controller’s buttons.

Buttons, switches, mounts and joysticks can be connected to the controller pad, so players can use one hand, a foot or even a chin and elbow to play.

According to Muscular Dystrophy UK, almost 60% of disabled people under 24 list gaming as their favourite or most frequent pastime. Now, instead of falling behind in a car chase or just giving up, they’re able to play equally with friends.

“It obviously has immense utility and value for users, but it’s also a symbol of a larger gesture from Microsoft,” explains UX Designer at Microsoft John Porter. “It’s really planting a flag in the ground and saying 'this is the point where we change things for the better'”.

Around 95% of type 1 diabetes cases are diagnosed in childhood. This makes a vast amount of children dependent on caregivers as there are no insulin pens or age-appropriate guidelines designed for children.

Thanks to Mexican designer Renata Souza Luque, there's now a fun-filled and medically viable way of giving children their independence. Thumy is an insulin pen and temporary tattoos that make a serious condition easier for small patients to conquer.

The reusable insulin pen is specially designed for a child's hand and level of coordination. On top of reducing waste, the pen aims to foster a sense of ownership and pride in their condition.

With the user in mind, Thumy's temporary tattoos are illustrated as bee trails, solar systems and paper planes.

For each injection, the child uses a new coloured dot as a guide. This technique encourages an intuitive rotation of injection sites, reducing the likelihood of scar tissue.

Around three days later, all the coloured dots are gone, and a new tattoo is applied somewhere else on the body.

A significant part of the design process for Souza was finding a balance between medical tool and toy. This balance is, for example, showcased in the pen's release dial, which is made of thermochromic plastic that changes colour when touched.

Thumy highlights a significant challenge in the health industry of providing appropriate treatments for all kinds of patients. Designing for children, in this case, not only opens up for an imaginative approach but is a clear statement of empowering people of all ages with chronic conditions.