Marinella Ferrara

• Architect, PhD in Design & Arts
• Associate Professor at Politecnico di Milano

The history of Italian design is inextricably intertwined with the history of plastic materials, following a path that originates in the first decades of the 20th century. In relation to the importance that the issue of plastics assumes today in the challenge towards the ecological transition, this essay aims to unfold the path of plastic materials...

The problem of getting in touch with distant, dangerous or inaccessible heritage intertwines with design research on engaging interaction to stage a proximity experience. This paper presents the first step towards the Smart Museum of the UNESCO site “Dalai Lama Summer Residence Complex” as a design challenge between architecture and design, distanc...

We introduce UltraSurfaces (USs), a new material design vision taking advantage of the latest developments in Electronic and Smart Materials, and their integration in layered substrates and other materials. The USs can detect phenomena in the environment, record and exchange data while being controlled by remote technologies, interact with users by...

Design Substraction and Addition. DIID 66, 2019 Subtracting and adding have played a main role in characterizing every single chapter of design history, alternately defining the syntax and the aesthetics of the less, as well as the one of the more. From a design point of view, the less or the more disclose as indicators of specific temporal time la...

Este artículo aborda el enfoque del diseño italiano de materiales, basado en una larga tradición de desafíos de intercambio entre prácticas intelectuales. Sobre la base de sus estudios anteriores, los autores, centrándose en el diseño y la historia de las empresas, explican el enfoque y las razones del proceso osmótico entre la tecnología y las hum...

Based on the principles of emerging bio-smart materials, in the framework of design-driven material innovation approach and cross-disciplinary research practices, the aim of this paper is to make clear how these materials are creating new opportunities to realize answers to the complex needs of contemporary society, while defining bio-smart materia...

This paper deals with the design of emerging, augmented, ICS materials in the framework of a Design-Driven Material Innovation approach, presenting a selection of concepts of Tangible Interfaces, developed during a workshop held at Politecnico di Milano. In the attempt to include digital technologies in product and interior design, enhancing human...

During the last decade, smart materials and systems have increasingly impacted several niches, including ‘one-off/limited edition experimental fashion’. As the traditional boundaries between what is art and what was not supposed to be art are now turning into osmotic membranes, we will speculatively focus on how ‘smart material systems’ are highly...

In the contemporary panorama of design, materials are gained an important role. We are the witnesses of an incredible acceleration in the evolution of the design practices and processes related to materials developments and applications. In the present issue, we want to introduce and formalised the concept of “diffuse materiality” for describing th...

During the last decade, smart materials have increasingly impacted on several niches, among which that of one-off/limited edition experimental fashion. Thanks to their performativity, due to the implementation of Smart Materials Systems, they have reached indeed catwalks as well as museums and galleries. As boundaries between what-is-art and what t...

During the last decade, smart materials have increasingly impacted on several niches, among which that of one-off/limited edition experimental fashion. Thanks to their performativity, due to the implementation of Smart Materials Systems, they have reached indeed catwalks as well as museums and galleries. As boundaries between what-is-art and what t...

This paper traces back Mediterranean-ness as genius loci and identity, questioning insights, materiality, phenomenology, aesthetics and communicational outcomes, referring to Ettore Sottsass and Le Corbusier. A journey in the past through Le Corbusier and Sottsass’s approaches helps to detect how archetypal resonances and classic heritage impacted...

To identify the actual evolution of the relationship between sciences, knowledge and design, the Madec (Material Design Culture Research Centre) of Politecnico di Milano, started in 2014 a wide debate with a series of contributions about innovation trajectories with well known scholars of many disciplines, researchers, professionals and companies....

The terms materials that move and kinetic materials signify a group of smart ma-terials with the ability to change shape, typically in a short time. The best-known and most widely studied group of materials that fall into this category are shape memory materials, more specifically shape memory alloys. However, shape memory materials are not the onl...

Some of the difficulties designers and design educators face when attempting a project with smart materials are their limited availability, high cost, and lack of practical but reliable information. The design community responds to these problems in many creative ways. Tinkering and experimentation with materials and simple tools is becoming popula...

Artists, designers, architects and engineers work together as interdisciplinary and collaborative teams in order to accomplish innovative yet challenging projects that implement kinetic materials and user experiences. Outstanding projects have been selected from different fields including product design, arts, architecture, fashion design, and exhi...

The capacity of kinetic materials to respond to environmental stimuli or external signals offers a unique opportunity for interface, interaction, and experience design. This signal can be in the form of user input that may be sensed by the kinetic material directly or transformed into a signal suitable for that particular material. Interaction is a...

This chapter gives a general outlook on methods used for the manufacturing or small-scale fabrication of kinetic materials. Some conventional processes are used to manufacture shape memory materials. Common metallurgical processes are suitable for shape memory alloys while special training and heat-treatment procedures are required for customized s...

This paper aims to trace back the didactic experience applied while developing the concepts of IOT baby/parents-custom solutions, during a Final Design Lab at the Design School of Politecnico di Milano. Three projects, respectively dealing with baby tubs, monitoring systems and electro smog shielding, will be analyzed in relation to the applied met...

This paper joins the debate on emerging materials and on the attention that design reserves for scientific innovations, interpreting them in terms of the trends and application scenarios being opened for design research. The two main trends in technical and scientific evolution – intelligence and bio – are considered in order to propose a new defin...

In the last years, new classes of advanced materials are emerging, influenced by computing, Internet of Things, and hybridization of design with science. These materials are overpassing conventional smart materials, by presenting additional degrees of intelligence. These are ICS Materials, an acronym for Interactive, Connected, and Smart Materials....

This paper defines the ICS materiality analyzing behaviors and components of Interactive, Connected, Smart materials. The authors propose a de-structuring analysis of the complexity of intelligent systems to find out the various elements that constitute ICS materiality. Thus, they become easily understood as working systems made of components that...

Kinetic materials range from well-known shape memory alloys to more “exotic” materials such as ferrogels and shape memory ceramics. The common characteristic of all these smart materials is their ability to undergo a predetermined shape change as a response to an external stimulus such as light, electricity, humidity, or heat. The shape change can...

This chapter aims to discuss selected applications of shape changing materials in different fields. Most of these examples involve shape memory alloys, particularly nitinol because at the present, this is the most established and reliable material for industrial applications. However, research efforts indicate that SMAs may be replaced by SMPs, f...

Living organisms move in search for food; they move to protect themselves from enemies, to search for shelter, to multiply and perpetuate the existence of their species, and for many other reasons. A great variety of motion exists in animals, plants, and bacteria. The majority of animals move by muscle contractions. Mammalians depend on their muscl...

This book presents a design-driven investigation into smart materials developed by chemists, physicists, materials and chemical engineers, and applied by designers to consumer products, buildings, interfaces, or textiles. Introducing a class of smart materials (referred to as stimuli-responsive, morphing or kinetic materials) that move and change t...

This article deals with the Italian Design approach to Materials based on a long tradition of challenging exchanges between intellectual practices. Focusing on design and enterprises history, the authors, on the basis of their previous studies, explain the approach and the reasons of the osmotic process between technology and humanities in Italy, a...

This is a chapter of the book IDEAS and the Matter, edited by Marinella Ferrara and Giulio Ceppi, that aims to present the founding research undertaken by the Politecnico di Milano’s Material Design Culture Research Centre (Madec). Founded in 2014, Madec obtained the Design Department’s support during its first year by being granted the Fondo di At...

This is a chapter of the book IDEAS and the Matter, edited by Marinella Ferrara and Giulio Ceppi, that aims to present the founding research undertaken by the Politecnico di Milano’s Material Design Culture Research Centre (Madec). Founded in 2014, Madec obtained the Design Department’s support during its first year by being granted the Fondo di At...

Smartness is generating several new contentions in terms of pragmatic aesthetics and interaction design, stimulating a debate on how design and advanced technologies can impact on reshaping human lives and behaviors. Many issues are currently arising not just in relation to the appearance of smart objects or spaces, but also in terms of relational...

Despite the large number of innovative materials developed in laboratories worldwide, their application in new mass-produced products is complicated. Design can reduce the risk that the research developed in scientific laboratories could fail to be properly exploited and triggering a beneficial cycle linking Science to Design. This paper present th...

Background: Neurological disturbances are frequently reported by HIV-infected patients, in particular with aging. A multitude of physical comorbidities has been shown to affect cognition in general populations in particular age and cardio-metabolic disease. However, a mild clinical picture can escape detection without formal neurological assessment...

Nel panorama del design contemporaneo ci si confronta sempre più spesso con esigenze progettuali fortemente condizionate dal sistema tecnologico caratterizzato dall'u-biquità e dalla connettività degli artefatti del quotidiano che danno vita a sistemi sempre più Intelligenti, Connessi e Smart. I designer sono chiamati a immaginare nuove esperienze...

The paper here proposed introduces the Design-driven Material Innovation Methodology as a systematic approach in new material-product development processes as a possible strategic tool for design schools, practitioners and SMEs. Scientists and engineers are problem solver, but to engender innovations of success requires not only technological explo...

« Do you believe in reality? » With this question French Philosopher and Sociologist Bruno Latour, who has often showed through his articles and publications his deep interest in design issues, starts the first chapter of his book Pandora’s Hope, (Harvard University Press, 1999), in which he discusses how to explore better the reality of science in...

Shape memory alloys and polymers respond to changes in temperature, light or other environmental stimuli by changing their shape. This paper shows new kinetic experiences with objects and surfaces that apply memory shape materials, describing some case histories based on design experimentations that open up new frontiers in design. The present arti...

This essay raises issues on the evolution of design by focusing on the relationship between design and science in the contemporary era. It presents design researches that show a strong relationship between scientific acquisitions and design to highlight the emerging role of Advanced Design. The author analyses in these design research projects t...

In 2014 the Material Design Cultures research centre (MADEC) of the Design Department of Politecnico di Milano, launched a series of lectures entitled The ideas and the Matter. The objective was to explore the latest developments in scientific knowledge and humanis-tic culture opening a debate between experts and students on scientific, socioeconom...

This paper introduces the new qualitative dimensions that smart materials bring in industrial and product design with the aim of stimulating designers to take a more proactive attitude in the choice and application of these materials. Chromogenic materials enable designers to make visible, by emitting colour signals, what is happening under certain...

This chapter introduces materials that change color with scientific definitions and explanations of different categories such as photochromic, thermochromic, and electrochromic materials. The behaviors in relation to the stimuli to which they react is presented and a general picture of the potential of these materials are given with some examples/a...

This chapter introduces key issues on the use of materials that change color as a design theme to experiment with its potential. It addresses issues such as the significance of color in design, design approaches toward and meaning attributed to dynamic color, theoretical implications and changes in design methodologies in the face of new tools and...

This chapter aims to explain various manufacturing processes used for commercial products that involve chromogenic materials. Challenges in the use of chromogenic pigments, inks, and dyes are presented based on industrial practice and patents. Some of the manufacturing processes are applicable to more than one type of chromogenic material type (the...

This chapter presents the subject and objectives of the book Materials That Change Color in the context of applied research and concept design. The implications of the techno-scientific research on theories and methods of design are outlined. Technical opportunities for new qualities given to objects of everyday life, like sensitivity, interactivit...

This chapter presents a number of case studies: products, projects, concepts, experiments, and smart systems using chromogenic materials. These were chosen based on their capacity to represent state of the art of the experimentation and application of materials that change color in different fields including product, interior, fashion, packaging, a...

This paper presents and advocates a method for teaching about materials in industrial design courses. The method has been developed by the authors in the academic sphere while teaching over the last six years on a number of degree courses – both the three-year basic programmes and the two-year specialist ones – at four Italian places of learning: t...

Questo articolo propone un’ampia riflessione sul ruolo che il design agroalimentare e agroindustriale gioca oggi come punto di partenza per processi di rigenerazione dei contesti locali e di sviluppo sostenibile delle attività economiche a livello locale. La cultura del design, utilizzando gli strumenti della comunicazione visiva, del prodotto e de...

Handcrafted practices of young designers, capable of acting as draftsman, craftsman-producers and selling agents of their own creations, are triggering the revaluation and the transformation of hand-crafted activity in Europe. The overview of the situation, which has reached the highest point in the occasion of the design week in Milan, also appear...