Human Sense
Taste @ St Dunstan in the East EC3R 5DDBrief: Conceive make and wear a design that extends human senses beyond the body.
Team Member: Jennoir Simpson, Mansi Chottani, Kye Li Chia, Ruoxi Song, Anushka Motiani.
Time Frame: Oct.3-Oct.13
Team Member: Jennoir Simpson, Mansi Chottani, Kye Li Chia, Ruoxi Song, Anushka Motiani.
Time Frame: Oct.3-Oct.13
This garden sets within the ruins of a Wren church after the Great Fire of London in 1666. We noticed that a lot of people that seems work around there were having lunch in the city garden. They were having coffee, sweets, snacks, and all kinds of boxed lunches. We started to think about how people who come to this place to eat affect their eating experience.
It has 5 or 6 separate benches in the center garden, and all of them together form a circle with a fire pit in the center. We realized that this kind of seating allows people to watch others eat their food or drinks at that moment. This inspires us to think if it will taste better when we see other people eating with us, just like the “mukbang”. We believe people feel comfortable eating food there and enjoy the peaceful moment at the same time.
We also tried to imitate them by having food, we grabbed coffee and other things that have different tastes. We did feel that we have more concentration on food when the environment is peaceful, quiet, and natural, and the focus makes food taste better. What’s more about when we think of taste is that we use our other senses to taste the food too, like eyes (we know what it tastes like when we see things), smells (we can guess what it tastes like through smells) and maybe some touch (to feel the textures if it’s eatable).
We also sniffed around, and feel the texture with our hand.
Based on this research, observation, and analysis, we found some major factors affecting how taste feels like, focus, vision, and smells.
Ideations
- Reflected and mirrored materials clothing
- Mirrored ring for reflecting food while putting food in the mouth
- Side shield eyewear for enhanced focus.
From previous research and analysis, we start to build prototypes based on the ideations. Also, we want to experiment all kinds of materials, it helps clarify and shape our design concepts. Since the garden acts like a sanctuary which blocks out the chaos, noise and the unpleasant, we tried to build a headwear that can distract us from the chaotic reality, and create a peaceful space to enhance our concentration.
We also tried to adding elements such as the noise cancellation pads and the green leaves with the active fresh smell that imitate presence of the garden. For the initial draft prototypes, we included the soft transparent material that cover the whole body. It builds as an enclosed object to enhance our tasting experience and allow one to focus on what we are eating.
During the experiment of the initial prototypes, we also found it can also be a sharable wearing experience. As another person can join the cover up materials and be able to see the other person eating but also have a focus of themselves having food. This concept creates an extra secure feeling that they can feel the presence of another person.
According to the “mukbang” livestreams, collaborative eating is a concept that gets popular. As we found the sharable experience makes more sense, we tried to continue on this direction.
Final prototype:
Elements:
1. Could try more tastes, like bitter, spicy, sweet, and more during the experience.
2. Maybe the distance is too close (feel a bit wired not seeing each other but very close to them).
3. Be careful with the decorations.
4. Well done on putting everything together.
We had a great team working experience, everyone makes great contributions to the project. Agree with applying different tastes to the prototype experiences and adding more interaction elements. Considering it’s a two week project, we are all very happy of how it turns out.
Curtain: transparent materials block out the busy surroundings which offers privacy and peace. It doesn’t block out competely and allow light to pass through.
Shareable experience: Apply the one arm(almost of a meter) distance which is the personal comfortable space to this experience. Through our search, just to feel other person’s presence make us feel secure and taste more.
Mirror: It helps enhance the eating experience by looking at yourself while eating food, and also make you concentrate on the food. Mirror also helps divide into two small space for each person.
Shareable experience: Apply the one arm(almost of a meter) distance which is the personal comfortable space to this experience. Through our search, just to feel other person’s presence make us feel secure and taste more.
Mirror: It helps enhance the eating experience by looking at yourself while eating food, and also make you concentrate on the food. Mirror also helps divide into two small space for each person.
Leaves and music: We attached leaves on the curtain and also inside of the curtain which offers natural smells to the experience. We also tried to encourage participants to touch them with hands, grind and feel the texture of them. Added jazz soft music according to jazz can often make people feel calm and chill, they are also used by a lot of peaceful space, like coffee shops.
Taste: we offered cookies and wine(inspired by the wine taste experience, use our other senses to feel the taste, such as vision and smells).
Taste: we offered cookies and wine(inspired by the wine taste experience, use our other senses to feel the taste, such as vision and smells).
Feedback:
1. Could try more tastes, like bitter, spicy, sweet, and more during the experience.
2. Maybe the distance is too close (feel a bit wired not seeing each other but very close to them).
3. Be careful with the decorations.
4. Well done on putting everything together.
Reflection:
We had a great team working experience, everyone makes great contributions to the project. Agree with applying different tastes to the prototype experiences and adding more interaction elements. Considering it’s a two week project, we are all very happy of how it turns out.