Équipe // Team: Ekaterina Frank & Pascal Xavier Poirier.

I worked as a freelance designer on a project lead by Clan Creatif, an advertising agency based in Montreal, Canada. In this project, I had the mandate to design and fabricate multiple corporate wine boxes which were meant as a gift in a business transaction.

Collaboratoire, a research chair at Concordia University, set up an architecture competition aiming at replacing an existing bus shelter on the Loyola Campus. As the closing element of the competition, the research chair held an exhibition on-site where panels had to be built to broadcast the information about the competition. The project being a collaboration, I took part in the design and creation of the structures and in the graphic display of the information. More about the process of making the panels Here!

Collaborative project by Michael MacLean, Pascal Xavier Poirier and Alexis Gosselin. In this project, the group of designers was fictionally tasked to generate a design intervention on a family owned land in Harrington, Qc. The family wanted to start a tradition where a frozen pond is transformed into a recreational skating rink and where the guests are plunged in a fascinating environment while engaging in festivities. The design focuses on the use of simple LED torches and tarp-like reflective surfaces projecting reflected rays onto natural volumes such as snow, trees, rocks, etc… which results in a surprising body of shimmering lights. This project was born out of a desire to explore artificial interventions in nature and ended up tapping into positive feelings of awe, nostalgia, contemplation of light patterns and re-discovery of Nature.

Un collaboration de Michael MacLean, Pascal Xavier Poirier et Alexis Gosselin. Pour ce projet, le groupe de désigner avait pour mandat fictif de créer une intervention créative sur une terre familiale dans la municipalité de Harrington, Qc. La famille voulait instaurer une tradition pour qu’à chaque hiver un étang soit transformé en patinoire récréative où les convives vivraient une expérience immersive et festive. l’intervention de Design fait recours à l’utilisation de lampes DEL et des surfaces souples en polymer réfléchissant qui projètent les rayons réfléchis dansants sur la neige, les arbres, les roches, etc… Ce projet avait pour intention initiale d’explorer l’implantation d’éléments artificiels en plein-air et s’est avéré être une expérience aux élans d’admiration pour le paysage, de nostalgie, de contemplation et de re-découverte.

How to reconcile the gap between the creation and marketing of an inclusive product aimed at a specific market while still being connected to an exclusive abstract concept such as Nordicity or a very alienated community such as the homeless, or the troubled youth?

Many ideas came up in our collective minds, yet the idea to impact the way people navigate their domestic enviroment was highly compelling. We wanted to create a product that would accompany the path of the user. Hence, we started to embrace the idea of creating slippers. These items would then be sold in a pop-up Arts&Craft Sale and all proceeds were sent to Chez Doris Women Shelter and St-James Youth Center as a way to support and finance their activities.

materials used: Cotton canvas, black leather off-cuts and recycled wool sweaters.
Techniques: Sewing and silk-screening fabric.

Team: Charlotte Bracho, Heidi de Paoli, Daniel Munoz Ortiz, Marianne Dupont-Gagnon and myself.

With a group of designers, we have created a physical structure that would help feed but also stimulate chickens living in domestic coops. The concept is that the chicken would peck at the food cylinders balanced on an arched horizontal beam fixed in position by a pivot. The movement resulting from the pecking of the animal would generate movement in the structure that would be unpredictable for the bird. Therefore, the structure would create a stimuli both satisfying the chicken's curiosity and some bodily functions (i.e. blood circulation within the body of the animal).

3d model: Rhino 5.
materials used: Maple (structure); crushed oyster shells, Common Reed, starch and organic binders (food pucks).
Techniques: Various wood machining and steam bending (structure); Crushing, mixing and heating ingredients (food pucks).

Team: Alexis Gosselin, Annabelle Daoust, Michael Maclean and myself.       

Space as a Cookbook was the result of a speculative design exploration in response to a challenge to create a cookbook targeted at students attending Concordia University. The problematic involved improving knowledge of nutrition as well as giving students recipes that encourage them to cook for themselves more often. Our design team opted to create a cookbook within space rather than in book form in order to address certain realities within student culture on campus: students spend more time at school than at home and access to kitchens on campus is lacking.
Space as a Cookbook was proposed for an atrium space which spanned three floors. The proposal used the walls, the floors, and the air above the space as its pages, allowing students to enter inside the book and engage with the space while acquiring knowledge and recipes. The project proposed to recentralize waste, integrate sinks with replaceable water tanks, incorporate grey water storage, and install stoves that allow the user to cook a meal on campus.

Team: Charlotte Bracho, Heidi De Paoli, Michael Maclean and Pascal Xavier Poirier