Mushroom Garden by Rodrigo Fortes

Hyper Island

Mushroom Garden

This is a project developed during the 'User experience' module on Hyper Island's Interactive Art Director program. the group had as a client Atracta, a company that owns a building-size LED-net screen in Stureplan, one of the most urban areas in Stockholm. Our challenge was to increase the interactivity and give more value to the screen content by showing new possibilities of a creative use of it.

Scope: design / interactive / motion

CONCEPT

Since the purpose of the project was to enhance the impact of Attracta's screen at Stureplan and show new possibilities of creative use of it, the group found that users’ needs were key. After researching, the common need was to feel included, part of that local or at least not overwhelmed by the non-inviting region. In other words, feel comfortable.

Considering those needs and the fact that the square is already a reference in the city, the groups' approach was to invert the perception of it and provide Stureplan with a landmark turning it into a more welcoming environment for people that currently do not visit the place.

One idea was to build some kind of installation that could bring even more value to that space but also provide with a new and long lasting interaction to passers. Taking advantage of the already traditional reference point, the Svampen (mushroom), the group decided to mix swedish references with the same technological tone behind Atracta’s LED screen. We came up with the mushroom garden.

The idea is to create a passive and warming interaction that guides people’s attention all the way to the screen as well as transforming the square into a living structure in the middle of the most urban place in Stockholm.