Category: Sustainable Practices

The Hand-Cranked Video Mirror is a device with which you have to operate a crank in order to generate the power necessary to see yourself. It is composed of a small LCD screen, a surveillance camera, and a power generating crank hacked out of a flashlight. Ideally I wanted to have the entire setup powered by the crank, but for now I am just able to power the video camera. The monitor is powered via wall power or battery, but it remains blank and the camera stays off until you operate the crank to generate the power for the camera. I removed the battery charging circuit from the crank so the voltage goes directly to the camera. As a result, your image disappears as soon as you stop cranking. Steady, rhythmic cranking provides the best image – frantic, fast cranking tends to get you nowhere. I like the idea that it takes energy, focus, and consistency to see your own image.

The C-Town Dress is a look at modules and my obsession with plastic bags. On the modules side, I was thinking about modules as pockets or containers and I wanted to see how I could reinvent or take a second look at some preexisting form. As for plastic bags, I feel as though I am plagued by them. I hate waste and these are materials that accumulate rapidly and involuntarily. I spent a lot of time trying to avoid them and realized it was close to impossible, so have recently been trying to come up with creative ways to repurpose them.

The dress is composed of 46 plastic C-Town shopping bags (C-Town is my local supermarket). The handles are snipped off and the sides are tucked in and then sewn to provide reinforcement. The top of the pouch is then rolled over to provide support for the soon to be pocket. The pouches are assembled in columns and then in rows, forming the front and back panels. The two panels are then sewn together, leaving the appropriate openings for arm and neck holes. All bags are left open as pockets, including those that comprise the sleeves.