Archive · Before Petit Pli

Satellites, swarms, lamps and lenses.

Before the company, the same design method tested on very different problems. The discipline-hopping is the point.

Hinged carbon-fibre satellite cells laid flat on a linen background

Aeronautics · 1U CubeSat

Self-deploying satellite cells

My master's dissertation explored concepts for a structure that deploys from a single wall of a 1U CubeSat and deforms elastically into a parabolic shape. The concluding design could unlock capabilities the CubeSat platform did not have before.

This is the folding research that seeded everything after it - the moment the geometry of the fold became a way of thinking.

Published with the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics

A black origami-pleated fabric ring on a workbench with tools and calculations

Fashion × engineering · Tokyo

Harajuku garment

A user-driven project that set out to merge fashion and engineering. Working with Rikarin, a Harajuku fashionista in Tokyo, I designed and prototyped an origami neck piece worn against the skin.

When switched on, embedded shape-memory alloy wire expands and the garment blossoms - clothing as a small, deliberate performance.

User-driven design · Shape-memory alloy

A turned vessel in wood, patinated brass and marbled resin

Object design · Materials

Lighting

A lamp constructed from wood, patinated brass and resin. Harmony between the three materials comes from careful form and colour analysis rather than decoration.

Light within the structure emphasises the depth of the patterns held in the resin, so the object changes as you move around it.

Wood · Patinated brass · Resin

A small multi-rotor quadcopter resting on an open hand

Robotics · Team of 22

Quadcopter swarms

The brief was to sew a web in mid-air using a swarm of quadcopters. In a team of twenty-two, my role was the construction pack that housed the web to be deployed between the trees.

Two fully autonomous quadcopters wove a web between two trees inside an indoor flight arena, and a third perched on it and descended at set intervals.

Published with the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics

Energy · Aerodynamics

Wind turbine

Design, build and test a working wind turbine. I chose optimal aerofoil sections for the root and tip of each blade, using published data and figures from XFOIL.

I drew the CAD for the blade, the nosecone and the mounting hub, and split each blade in two to fit the 3D printer before assembly and testing.

Aerofoil selection · CAD · 3D print

Design research · Eye tracking

Self-perception

An investigation into how people perceive themselves: how they physically scan their own faces, using eye-tracking technology, and how that differs from the way others read the same photographs.

It is here for a reason. Good design starts with watching people closely, and this project is where I learned to.

Eye tracking · Perception study