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- Federico Trevia
FEDERICO TREVIA
Researcher - Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands
SUPERVISOR
Dr. Jan Carel Diehl
Federico is currently working on project DELTAP at the Industrial Design Engineering Faculty of TU Delft, in collaboration with the faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences at TU Delft. Project DELTAP focuses on developing an integrative approach for smart small-scale piped water supply in the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna Delta. The focus of Federico’s research is on the exploration and use of local materials (both natural and waste-based) in Rajshahi, Bangladesh, as resource for DIY-materials, together with the integration of the water system in the community. Main areas of interest are fulfillment of system requirements, water distribution in the village and social adoption.
Prior to this Federico received his Bachelor degree in Industrial Design from Politecnico di Milano in 2011 and his Master degree in Design For Interaction at TU Delft in 2013 with a graduation project at Philips Design. After his studies he has been working for different sized companies and industries both in Italy and The Netherlands, spanning from education start-ups and product design studios to industrial groups and advertising agencies.
Working as a professional designer he gained experience in human centered design, product design and conceptualization, process visualization and project management.
Materials exploration, use and enhancement has always been at the heart of his projects, in the quest of defining how to convey experiences through shape, form and texture. In his career Federico was involved in projects related to the discovery of textile’s transparency, perception and reflectivity for space design; wood selection, shaping and treatment for public space and interior design projects; aluminum treatment for texture, shape and finishing in luxury product design; paper and cardboard investigation and treatment for packaging design.
Current Project
DIY MATERIAL EXPERIENCES IN DELTAS
In this project, Federico Trevia explores how (new) materials are experienced in BoP countries, specifically in Deltas in India and Bangladesh; as well as the dynamics of the society and the organization to be taken into account in the development and implementation of DIY material practices for locally produced products.
PUBLICATIONS
Evelien Van de Garde-Perik, Federico Trevia, Adam Henriksson, Luc Geurts and Helle Ullerup (2016). Getting a GRIP at the Design of a Nature Inspired Relaxation Space for Work-Related Stress. International Journal of Arts and Technology, Volume 9, Issue 3. https://doi.org/10.1504/IJART.2016.078612
- Ziyu Zhou
ziyu zhou
Ph.D. Candidate - Politecnico di Milano, Department of Design, Italy
Visiting PhD student – Offenbach University of Art and Design (Hochschule für Gestaltung Offenbach am Main), Institute for Materialdesign, Germany
Supervisor
Prof. Manuela Celi
Ziyu Zhou is a Ph.D. candidate in Politecnico di Milano, Department of Design. Through analyzing the teaching and learning process on materials in design, she is devoting her research on exploring what materials and material education can bring to design students, and, most importantly, how do they work. She is committed to clarifying the explanation on relationships mainly between materials experience and the design teaching and learning activities.
Prior to this, in 2015, Ziyu obtained her Bachelor degree in Industrial design in Jiangnan University, Wuxi, China. In the same year, she starts her Master study in Product Service System Design in Politecnico di Milano, Department of Design, Italy. During her study, she gained lots of experience and skills on product design and design thinking through a series of national projects / international design competitions. Also, she has proficient communication abilities as a designer through learning under differentiated cultures. In 2016, she attended the course “Designing Materials Experience” by Valentina Rognoli and started her story on materials and design fortunately. After one year in 2017, she got her Master degree through the graduation project: DIY bioplastic Club. With the integration of her knowledge in DIY materials, product design, service system design and interactive design, through designing a toolkit on enabling people to make their personalized DIY bioplastics, she started her research on how people view and use the materials experience to enrich their ideas and design.
The main topics of Ziyu’s research and practice are situated in the intersection between: [1]The generic process, methodologies and spaces in educating design students on materials and through materials; [2] Emerging activities applying material experience into design education; [3] Development and creative practices in material-driven design; [4] Multisensory design with materials; [5] self-production, DIY, trans-disciplinary practices for materials generation.
Current Project
MATERIAL EDUCATION FOR DESIGN
The relationship between materials and design is already being clarified by many scholars. With the perspective-changes on material and design in the past and the present, material potentially influences on our views on design. Nowadays, the education of materials for design is not restrained in listing the knowledge about materials and their technical attributes which can fit design, but emphasized on guiding students to learn how to provoke experience to users, with different choices of materials or even create new materials. Sensorial-expressive characterization of materials is getting more attention from design educators and students in the start of material investigations. Starts from these viewpoints towards materials in design and design education in recent years, this research will take our sight onto how could material drive innovation and facilitate the higher design education, through inspiring students’ design thinking and gaining design their design abilities comprehensively.
Publications
Zhou, Z. (2020). Engaging Material Education in Design. The Design Journal, 24(1), 149-159. DOI: 10.1080/14606925.2020.1830549
Zhou, Z., Rognoli, V., & Celi, M. (2020). Features of material exploration projects emerged in design schools. In Conference Proceedings EDUNOVATIC 2020 (pp. 704-709). Redine.
Zhou Z., Rognoli, V. (2020). Designing Materials and Material Designers: Research by DIY-Materials Research Group. ZHUANGSHI Journal, 2020 (01. Total No. 321):17-23
Zhou Z., Rognoli, V. (2020). Material Education: New Training, New Skills. Chapter in MaterialDesigners Book.
Zhou, Z., & Rognoli, V. (2019). Material Education in Design: From Literature Review to Rethinking. In Fifth International Conference for Design Education Researchers (pp. 111-119). METU Department of Industrial Design.
Zhou. Z.; Rognoli. V.; Ayala-Garcia. C. (2018), Educating designers through Materials Club, 4th International Conference on Higher Education Advances (HEAd’18), http://dx.doi.org/10.4995/HEAd18.2018.8206
- Roya Aghighi
ROYA AGHIGHI
Designer in residence
SUPERVISOR
Roya is a multidisciplinary designer holding two industrial design degrees from Emily Carr University of Art and Design, Canada and Iran University of Science and Technology. Through her practice she aims to highlight the critical role of design in shaping human behaviours. Being a multidisciplinary designer, she activates the gap between various fields and aims to push the borders between traditional academic disciplines to explore and introduce alternative future possibilities.
She has been exploring with materials as the fundamental element to re-imagine the role of designer as well as shifting the emphasis from product to process. She believes that focusing on materials could shape a new way to experience the world and how we position ourselves within it. Roya has been one of the material activist designers-collaborating with material engineers, scientists and biologists at University of British Colombia for past years to activate bio-design practices in Canada. She was speaker, Panelist and her work was presented in various exhibitions and conferences such as: Fashion Colloquium-Arnhem Netherlands 2018, Vancouver Design Week-2018, Pollima Material Revolution-Los Angles 2018, Bioneers conference-Los Angles 2018. Roya currently is a designer in residence at Material Experience Lab working on application of living textiles in design practice and researching its impact on human interactions with clothing.
CURRENT Project
IN COLLABORATION WITH THE MATERIALS EXPERIENCE LAB
The adoption of fast fashion has had disruptive effects on environmental, social and behavioural factors globally. The drastic increase to the environmental impacts of textile waste and fast fashion consumption urgently need to be addressed. The fundamentals of our global/economic fashion industry need to be restructured beginning with the destructive nature of our current mainstream relationship to clothing. This dynamic has significant consequences. Fashion consumption has become a passive act, and we no longer care for the longevity of our clothing. Clothing is often disposed long before it reaches its expected life. The negative impacts of textile and fashion industry from environmental aspects are far greater than what it could be seen on the surface. From the 500,000 toxic nano-fibres that are released into water every time we wash our clothes, to the enormous carbon emissions emitted through both the production and disposal of our clothing, fashion has become a compromise that comes at a huge human, social, and environmental cost. What if clothes were alive and photosynthesized?
- Prarthana Majumdar
Prarthana Majumdar
Ph.D. Candidate - Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands
Supervisors
Prarthana Majumdar is a PhD candidate in the department of Design Engineering at Delft University of Technology, the Netherlands.
Prarthana graduated as the highest performer in Mechanical Engineer from Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati (IIT) and later received her Masters Cum Laude from Stanford University, USA. She worked at Apple, Inc. for two years wherein she fell in love with good design. She has interned in the field of Sustainable Management for small scale handicraft industries in India. She has also been leading two projects for the development of portals that promote connectivity among students and alumni in IIT's.
Her areas of interest are: Materials, Innovation Strategy, Technology Do-it-yourself.
Project (2016-17)
DIY MATERIAL EXPERIENCES IN DELTAS
Her project as a PhD scholar focuses on promoting Do-it-Yourself material practices in the Base of the Pyramid, primarily India and Bangladesh. She focuses on Social Innovation and Materials Experience to understand how local eco-materials and recycled materials can be used for prosumption products in such developing countries. The project aims at bridging concepts and technologies like 3D printing and crowdsourcing to the realm of Design for Base of the Pyramid and contributing towards democratization of innovation and manufacturing in this segment that constitutes 70% of the global population.
PublicationS
- Majumdar, P., Karana, E., Ghazal, S., Sonneveld, M.H. (2017). The Plastic Bakery: A case of material driven design. In Alive. Active. Adaptive: Proceedings of International Conference on Experiential Knowledge and Emerging Materials (EKSIG 2017), June 19-20, Delft, the Netherlands, pp. 116-128.
Majumdar, P., & Banerjee, S. (2017). The Challenges to Sustainable Growth of the Micro Scale Kuhila Craft Industry in India (6th International Conference on Research and Design, iCoRD’17).
Majumdar, P., Ji, S., & Banerjee, S. (2017). Disconnect between Consumer Preferences of Young-Urban Buyers and the Value Proposition of the Rattan and Bamboo Furniture Industry in Assam (6th International Conference on Research and Design, iCoRD’17)
- Luca Alessandrini
Luca alessandrini
Ph.D. Candidate - Department of Design, Politecnico di Milano, Italy
Supervisor
Prof. Valentina Rognoli
Luca Alessandrini grows up immersed in the world of design and entrepreneurship working as designer and project manager for Stilema s.r.l. from 2010 to 2015 traveling between China, Italy and Middle-East.
Intrigued by innovative disruptive processes and ideas generation, in 2014 Luca moves to London to join the double MSc/MA in Innovation Design Engineering between Royal College of Art and Imperial College.
On 2016, Luca patents an innovative approach to exploit the acoustic properties of natural composite materials. With the use of this technology, he designs a series of musical instruments built using a silk and spider silk composite obtaining international recognition and winning several awards.
On 2020, Luca became a funded PhD student at the Politecnico di Milano fostering his research previously developed working with natural materials; meanwhile Luca is consulting brands, designing and engineering innovative products with an aware perspective leading to sustainable production paths.Current Project
ORGANIC WASTE EXCHANGE NETWORK/PLATFORM
This research aims to create an “organic waste network/platform” able to supply waste and biodegradable products that could be turned into “raw materials”. In this regard, the research will focus on the identification, classification and mapping of a series of waste products with properties that enable them to be reintegrated in scalable production processes and to create new sustainable materials suitable for design and consumption products.
- Yask Kulshreshtha
YASK KULSHRESHTHA
Visiting researcher - Faculty of Industrial Design Engineering, Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands
PhD candidate -the Faculty of Civil Engineering & Geosciences, Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands
SupervisorS
Yask Kulshreshtha is a visiting researcher at the Faculty of Industrial Design Engineering and a PhD candidate at the Faculty of Civil Engineering & Geosciences. He is conducting research on building affordable, durable, and desirable homes using locally available mud and biological resources.
After finishing his bachelors in Engineering from BVM Engineering college in India, he moved to Delft and started an MSc program in Civil Engineering. In his master thesis, he developed a corn starch based material (named CoRncrete) and continued researching on it after graduating (with honours) in 2015. Yask moved back to Inda in 2016 to embark on a nine months-long backpacking trip in India. On this trip, he spent time learning the traditional building construction methods and used this knowledge to write a PhD proposal that took him back to Delft in 2017. Since then, Yask is carrying out multidisciplinary research at the intersection of materials sciences, civil engineering, geosciences, architecture, and design. He is fascinated by cow-dung and investigating the science behind its well-known water-resistant properties. He was recently awarded a grant from the Dutch science foundation (NWO) to extend his work on cow-dung and explore its application as an ecological brick that can regulate the indoor climate of buildings. Within this project, he is actively involved in research with the materials experience lab.
Current Project
COW-DUNG MUD BRICK INSTALLATION
The project aims at creating an installation that transforms from one form to another by gradually disintegrating under the influence of rain and wind. This installation would be built on a biological cow farm in Delft. The installation aims to invoke people to re-think natural building material as an eco-friendly alternative to concrete and fired brick construction.
PUBLICATIONS
Marsh, A. T. M., & Kulshreshtha, Y. (2021). The state of earthen housing worldwide: how development affects attitudes and adoption. (Aceepted in Building Research & Information)
Kulshreshtha, Y., Mota, N. J. A., Jagadish, K. S., Bredenoord, J., Vardon, P. J., van Loosdrecht, M. C. M., & Jonkers, H. M. (2020). The potential and current status of earthen material for low-cost housing in rural India. Construction and Building Materials, 247, 118615. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2020.118615
Kulshreshtha, Y., Schlangen, E., Jonkers, H. M., Vardon, P. J., & van Paassen, L. A. (2017). CoRncrete: A corn starch based building material. Construction and Building Materials, 154, 411–423. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2017.07.184
Paassen, L. van, & Kulshreshtha, Y. (2017). Biopolymers: Cement Replacement. In Cultivated Building Materials. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783035608922-013
- Alessia Romani
ALESSIA ROMANI
Ph.D. Candidate - Politecnico di Milano, Department of Design, Italy
Research Fellow – Politecnico di Milano, Department of Chemistry, Materials and Chemical Engineering “Giulio Natta”, Italy
www.piulab.it
Supervisors
Prof. Marinella Levi
Prof. Valentina Rognoli
Alessia Romani is a PhD candidate in Design at the Department of Design (Politecnico di Milano), and she currently works as Research Fellow at the Department of Chemistry, Materials and Chemical Engineering “Giulio Natta” of the same university. Her main research interests focus on the interdisciplinary connection between Design, Materials and Additive Manufacturing. She aims at bridging design and engineering through the lens of materials and digital technologies. Also, she is interested in new design strategies and approaches to additive manufacturing, new materials and finishing for design and additive manufacturing, parametric and computational design, design for sustainability and circular economy.
She is actively involved in two main research projects: “FiberEUse - Large scale demonstration of new circular economy value-chains based on the reuse of end-of-life fiber reinforced composites” (H2020 EU Funded project - Grant Agreement N. 730323-1) and “+Ability” (Codesign of 3D Printed Customized Assistive Technology). She previously took part in “NNCF – Noi Non Ci Fermiamo” project funded by Roche S.p.A. (Codesign of Assistive Technology for Rheumatic Diseases).
Alessia is currently part of +LAB, 3D printing lab of Politecnico di Milano, and she has joined the Materials Experience Lab after the beginning of her PhD path. Her PhD research aims at investigating the interdisciplinary link between design, materials and additive manufacturing in circular economy contexts, fostering the exploitation of new circular materials and strategies in the design practice. Previously, she received her BSc in Product Design in 2015 from Politecnico di Milano, and she obtained her MSc in Design & Engineering in 2018 (full marks) from the same university with a thesis focused on the codesign of 3D printed customized assistive technology developed at +LAB. During her studies, she also worked as a designer in the household appliances and textile fields.
Through her research experience, she had the opportunity to merge design research and materials engineering, gaining expertise at the intersection of the two disciplines. She also collaborated as teaching assistant and co-supervised MSc thesis of the two disciplinary fields (MSc in Design & Engineering, BSc and MSc in Materials and Nanotechnology Engineering). Moreover, she has authored publications in peer-reviewed journals, participated at international conferences and organized workshops focused on 3D printing, materials and design.
Current Project
DESIGN, MATERIALS AND ADDITIVE MANUFACTURING IN CIRCULAR ECONOMY CONTEXTS
Considering the exploitation of fossil derivatives for human activities, the importance of sustainability is going to constantly increase in the next years. New circular economy models should be investigated to reduce the human impact on earth. As a result, design, materials and digital technologies play a crucial role in this change, and a wider range of circular materials and design strategies should be implemented. Nevertheless, their combined integration in the design practice is still challenging, and designers are not always aware of these possibilities. At the same time, the potential applications of these materials and their experiential aspects are scarcely considered in the conventional development process.
The aim of this research is to investigate the interdisciplinary link between design, materials and additive manufacturing in circular economy contexts. At a later stage, the goal is to foster the integration of new circular materials and design strategies based on additive manufacturing in the design practice. Starting from specific case studies, the research will be focused on the investigation of new circular materials and design strategies for additive manufacturing through a design engineering experimental approach. Afterwards, new experiential tools will be developed to exploit the potential of emerging materials and strategies for new design applications in circular economy models.
Publications
Romani, A., Suriano, R., Mantelli, A., Levi, M., Tralli, P., Laurila, J., Vuoristo, P. (Forthcoming, 2021). Composite Finishing for Reuse. In: Systemic Circular Economy Solutions for Fiber Reinforced Composites.
Mantelli, A., Romani, A., Suriano, R., Levi, M., Turri, S. (2021, Forthcoming). Additive manufacturing of recycled composites. In: Systemic Circular Economy Solutions for Fiber Reinforced Composites.
Mantelli, A., Romani, A., Suriano, R., Levi, M., Turri, S. (2021) Direct Ink Writing of Recycled Composites with Complex Shapes: Process Parameters and Ink Optimization. Advanced Engineering Materials, In press.
Mantelli, A., Romani, A., Suriano, R., Diani, M., Colledani, M., Sarlin, E., Turri, S., Levi, M. (2021) UV-Assisted 3D Printing of Polymer Composites from Thermally and Mechanically Recycled Carbon Fibers. Polymers, 13, (5):726. https://doi.org/10.3390/polym13050726
Romani, A., Levi, M. (2020) Parametric Design for Online User Customization of 3D Printed Assistive Technology for Rheumatic Diseases. In: De Paolis L., Bourdot P. (eds) Augmented Reality, Virtual Reality, and Computer Graphics. AVR 2020. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 12243. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-58468-9_14
Romani, A., Mantelli, A., Suriano, R., Levi, M., Turri, S. (2020) Additive Re-Manufacturing of Mechanically Recycled End-of-Life Glass Fiber-Reinforced Polymers for Value-Added Circular Design. Materials, 13, (16): 3545. https://doi.org/10.3390/ma13163545
Romani, A., Orlando, G., Convertino, R., Zappalà, F., Baldassin, R., Pisu, M.G., Lorè, A., Digioia, S., Brambilla, E., Marcato, G., Agresta, I., Basciu, F., Fausti, V., Ravalli, G., Mantelli, A., Levi, M., Donati, C. (2019). CoDesign, Stampa 3D e Medicina per la Progettazione di Prodotti personalizzabili d’Uso Quotidiano. In: Reumatismo, 71:286-93. Società Italiana di Reumatologia (SIR), Rimini. (Invited)
Romani, A., Mantelli, A., Levi, M. (2019) Circular Design for Value-Added Remanufactured End-of-Life Composite Material via Additive Manufacturing Technology. In: Segalàs, J., Lazzarini, B. (eds) Proceedings of the 19th European Roundtable for Sustainable Consumption and Production – Circular Europe for Sustainability: Design, Production and Consumption, Book of Papers (1): 491-512. Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Barcelona.
Material is a Medium. It communicates ideas, beliefs, approaches; compels us to think, feel and act in certain ways; enables and enhances functionality and utility. Materials Experience emphasises this role of materials as being simultaneously technical and experiential.
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