Mate­r­i­al+ Future design issues

Togeth­er, bay­ern design and the Neues Muse­um Nürn­berg will be show­ing a design exhi­bi­tion on the top­ic of new mate­ri­als in the six façade rooms of the muse­um from April 21, 2023. The exhi­bi­tion illus­trates how designers:inside today not only use new mate­ri­als in their design, but also explore more sus­tain­able and inno­v­a­tive mate­ri­als and pro­cess­ing meth­ods themselves.

New mate­ri­als and mate­ri­als have always had a major impact on the design dis­ci­pline. How­ev­er, the con­fronta­tion with resource scarci­ty, cli­mate and bio­di­ver­si­ty crises is lead­ing designers:in to increased reflec­tion as well as a new urgency in the use of mate­ri­als, their ori­gins and man­u­fac­ture. Eco­log­i­cal require­ments and their social and eco­nom­ic con­di­tions are in focus.

The exhi­bi­tion brings togeth­er select­ed design stud­ies and objects in the three chap­ters Research, Appli­ca­tion and Spec­u­la­tion. The exhibits illus­trate how design­ers not only use new and respon­si­ble mate­ri­als as func­tion­al mate­ri­als, but also con­scious­ly employ them as design elements.

In the the­mat­ic field of research, the exhi­bi­tion shows exam­ples of how design­ers are already involved in the process of devel­op­ing and design­ing new mate­ri­als. “New mate­ri­als” are most­ly under­stood as vari­ants, con­nec­tions or pro­cess­ing of exist­ing mate­ri­als. Exper­i­ments with region­al or reused mate­ri­als based on algae, micro­bial cel­lu­lose or lignin illus­trate how design­ers coop­er­ate with researchers and there­by help deter­mine the direc­tion of research in terms of sus­tain­able design.

The Appli­ca­tion chap­ter shows design objects and sys­tems that use inno­v­a­tive mate­ri­als. Here, design uses new mate­ri­als not only as design ele­ments, but also con­sid­ers the good usabil­i­ty and vis­i­bil­i­ty of pro­duc­tion and recy­cling process­es of the mate­ri­als. The design of closed-loop sys­tems moti­vates man­u­fac­tur­ers and users to use mate­ri­als more than once. Exem­plary prod­ucts by Ste­fan Dietz or Tom Dixon are presented.

Final­ly, under the head­ing of spec­u­la­tion, research and appli­ca­tions are pre­sent­ed that are not yet fea­si­ble or imple­ment­ed, but which raise ques­tions and future possibilities.

The exhi­bi­tion is curat­ed by bay­ern design and can be seen dur­ing the usu­al open­ing hours of the Neues Muse­um Nürnberg.