John James Marshall thesis.pdf - OpenAIR @ RGU - Robert Gordon ...

everything and then we’ve got to study the video to see what works and what
doesn’t work. It’s like trying to design from all angles.
The photo on the right was the first full garment we made up. The left is just
two fabrics we were working on. We actually showed that at Siggraph in Boston
this year at what used to be called the cyber fashion show which thankfully it no
longer is. So that was really interesting - we got quite a reaction from people
who didn’t know what was going on when she started to drape her dress into a
large tank of water.
I’m also involved in something else that crosses some boundaries. A group of us
in the University got together over coffee and decided to do a bit of work
together. We are called Call Centre Collective because they shoved us into an
office space that really resembled a horrible call centre. Ruth is an architect,
Saoirse is a new media artist but she used to be a product designer, Doris is
quite a traditional fine artist a painter and printmaker, Emma is a textile artist
and then there is me. We are involved in quite a large community project at the
moment. Donegall Pass is a very tight, small, inner city, working class, very
loyalist community in Belfast which is under a lot of pressure - because it is a
prime place in the city centre – from corporate developments on all sides.
There is a site at the end of the Pass which is derelict. The Regeneration Officer
for the area is currently in talks with the Housing Executive about trying to
negotiate that the community will take on this site to develop it for themselves.
There is a big problem with housing in the area. The Regeneration Officer came
to us after hearing Ruth talk at some City Council event and asked us to come
down and do some work in the community. Not to do a participatory design
process but to try and find ways to involve the community so that at some time
in the future they would be ready to take on a cooperative design project as part
of the regeneration of the area.
We have been down there for about five months off and on, getting to know
people, looking at the area and thinking about things. As a way of launching
ourselves into the whole thing we got involved in a project called Space Shuttle -
which is the silver box there. It is a model of a gallery space in Belfast, part of a
different project that we have pulled into this one. So we were down in Donegall
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