Salz.
Salz is a project which started in January 2019 as a conceptional study. During winter time I always put a vessel full of tap water on top of the radiators in order to keep the air humid. Once the vessel ran dry, I realized a matt, milky and somehow interesting finish of chalk at the bottom of the glass. And I started wondering if this desiccation could lead into a product. That was the starting point of Salz.
How can desiccation be part of a design process?
All of us will be affected by climate change dramatically within the next few years. Salz tries to find solutions how we can rethink the production process in the near future in a more sustainable and natural way.
sustainability, adaption & inclusivity
Sustainability can be achieved by inclusivness, in the sense of including the consumer into the production process. Consumers in the future will be more critical as seen in the food segment already. Which incredients, material and production process was used will also topics in other businesses like for example furniture industry.
During summer 2019 I experimented with different salt and food colors in order to understand the growth of crystals.
The first notion based on the research was to design a lamp. The idea of Salz is to integrate the consumer but especially nature during the fabrication .The concept is that you buy the lamp which consists of a glas bowl and a lamp stand. Then you either fill it with salt you bought and mix it with water, or you use saltwater you might took from a vacation and fill it into the glassbowl. After that you put it into the sun. After a few days a unique salt crust is growing and you can harvest your lampshade like a plant. You will have an emotional connection to the product which might also has a special story to a vacation.
After 5 days salt water in the glass bowl is drying out and crytals appear on the inner surface of the glass bowl. They will start growing to the top of the vessel.
After 1 week a unique salt crust grew on the inner surface and frosted the lamp shade.
Different lamp stands were designed and manufactured. Ceramic were the first designs, giving Salz a more human asthetic. But also a milled oak Version will be shown on the next slides.
