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Life on Mars: First Person Speculation in the (Imaginary) Everyday

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[ ] With Design: Reinventing Design Modes (IASDR 2021)

Abstract

Recent development in space exploration has focused on the possibility of human life on Mars. How can we design for such an unexplored environment, and in turn what might such designs tell us about designing for the everyday on Earth? We make use of a process of speculative 1st person perspective design to create a material playground for producing a set of printed textile structures to support the experience of Martian daily wear, while paying attention to Earthly concerns such as material scarcity and locality of resources. This pictorial describes the outcomes of this process with a focus on the notions personal safety, empowerment, and comfort. The contribution is a design exemplar of first- person design in an extreme context that suggests the use of the playful speculation of space travel to ultimately explore human experience and values on everyday Earth.

I. Camps, V. Vekemans and M. Visscher—These authors contributed equally.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank all experts for sharing their knowledge. Furthermore, we would like to thank the Fashion Tech Farm, Innovation Space and the Future Everyday group for giving us the opportunity and tooling to do this project.

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Correspondence to Mirthe Visscher .

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Camps, I., Vekemans, V., Visscher, M., Tomico, O., Andersen, K. (2022). Life on Mars: First Person Speculation in the (Imaginary) Everyday. In: Bruyns, G., Wei, H. (eds) [ ] With Design: Reinventing Design Modes. IASDR 2021. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-4472-7_180

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