Commensal

This is a student project on Computation-based Basic Design at Bilgi. The group of students completed it in the 2015 Spring semester. This research was very successful in achieving its intended physical performance, which was holding on to a tree designed for (and even near climbing up in some cases). The system is lightweight yet very powerful, holding on but not causing any harm to its “host body“, the tree. The group of students named the design “Commensal” and explained their project as;

Commensal” is one of the symbiotic life forms, in which one of the two life forms lives together and provides benefit while the other one neither provides benefit nor gets harmed. For example, some herbaceous plants living on tall trees can benefit from sunshine much more effectively thanks to these trees, while the trees get neither benefit nor harm from them. These life forms can also live without each other, but when they separate, beneficial one’s life quality decreases significantly. (malnutrition due to lack of enough sunshine, change of shape, etc.) Within this conceptual background, we bound our design project to a tree. We developed a fishnet pattern with sticks and rubber bands. We used it to attach our material system to the tree, without causing any harm to it.

Students are Azra Tulu Cumur, Büşra Hamzaoğlu, and Gülten Fatma Oran. Although it is very interesting and educational, this project requires more study on geometric rules. The students draw the system in Rhino. However, it became impossible to fully understand and model it.