Update

This week I have been trying to expand the ideas I was working on. I contacted Bill Miller, the painting tech, about finding a place for me to do something larger scale in resin. He hasn't found anything yet, but said he would get back to me today about that. I also heard that Brown has a room where the whole thing is like a hood, so I am planning on checking that out. I am still not sure if it is worth it to do something larger in resin as the fumes that come off of it even after it is mainly dry might be a lot depending on the scale.

For my "skeleton knit wall" idea where the knit fabric would be a space divider/wall for the home I have been thinking about where the areas of transparency should be. I like the idea of a skeleton wall, that would be showing the structure of that wall based on its function. I worked on a new sample this week fusing 3 different parts of different transparencies together. I have to figure out what kind of units would best work as there is a size limitation with the bed of the knitting machine and I can not do the whole thing in one or two pieces. I will either have to do skinny long vertical pieces that transitition within the patterning from top to bottom, or skinny long pieces that each have their own pattern and then are turned horizontally and fused together. My other option would be to do small patchwork like units, but I am not really as interested in that idea. I think in theory though I could design something that would be fairly large and produced industrially. I would like to find out the largest size a jaquard knitting machine can produce.

I have also been thinking about the fence idea. I have been trying to observe how plants interact with fences and buildings around Providence. Now that all of the plants are starting to grow it is interesting how it has changed certain fences that I see every day. I like the idea that it is then providing more coverage when people are outside more. I took out a book on tree houses because I wanted to see how they built homes around existing trees. I have also been looking into erosion control fences, which I think could be an interesting way to take this fence idea. The structure of them seems like something that could be integrated into a fence for a yard that would also hold back land. Also though it really made me think of where I grew up and the erosion control efforts at the beach. There are fences to keep people off of the dunes as well as signs. I remember when I was younger planting new dune grass to help stop erosion. I was thinking this could be a use for a knit fabric that would also be very integrated aesthetically. This is something that personally would be very important to me, and although a newer idea something I may decide to work on for the final.