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Prickly Pear fibre in leaf. — © Martina Taranto

Nuovomondo is a material research which explores the characteristics of the fibre extracted from the Prickly Pear and its potential applications to sustainable product design to envision alternative materialities for the future.

Nuovomondo. A material research.

Nuovomondo is a material research which explores the characteristics of the fibre extracted from the Prickly Pear and its potential applications to sustainable product design.
The fibre with its unique natural pattern and properties opens to the design of new items with a paradigmatic aesthetic. Nuovomondo fosters a conception of the design practice divergent from one motivated by impact minimization, towards logics of bio-integrated material design.

The plant’s biological necessities and survival skills in vision of material usage were studied. The festering nature of the plant makes it a good ecological partner for sustainable material design. The objects produced to demonstrate possible applications of the fibre have been developed to be completely organic and free of synthetic components.

The approach undertaken with Nuovomondo fosters ecosystemic logics of design against traditional synthetic readings of life diverged from bio-integrated conducts, biological creativity and aesthetic.
To empower the practice of symbiotic design, to redefine the perception of the role humans can play with our technical intelligence in the ecological economy of life.

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About Martina Taranto

Martina Taranto is a designer-artist-researcher. Master graduate from the Royal College of Art, London from the Design Products programme in 2019, currently research fellow at Politecnico di Milano studying design practices for environmental sustainability. Her work and research aim to build a fluid dialogue between different branches of knowledge, human challenges and environmental causes through material practices of design.

Prickly Pear plant. — © Martina Taranto

Prickly Pear fibre in the shape of a bowl. — © Martina Taranto

Prickly Pear fibre in the shape of a bowl. — © Martina Taranto

Nuovomondo bowl series.

Strijp T+R area, BioArt Laboratories, Oirschotsedijk 14-10 , Map No. A1
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