In the first session, the camp students, including myself, made name badges using a specialized compressor and shared our favorite museums and interests such as art, architecture, and engineering.
In the following session, the counselors introduced to us a unique process called “Design Thinking.” The Design Thinking process is classified into four steps: defining problems, getting ideas, prototyping and making, and lastly, testing and evaluating. The counselors gave us a hypothetical and nonsensical problem for us to find solutions. The predicament was how to get everyone on their designated floor in a skyscraper with no elevators, escalators, or stairs. Diverse creative solutions came out: using an extended ladder or a helicopter, building an exterior elevator or a scaffolding, making a box which holds people and carrying it with a crane, and even tilting the building to its side. Using the crane solution as an example, we learned about the potentialities of failure and the imperative need for making and testing a prototype before producing the actual crane and the crate. After exploring the Design Thinking process, the instructor challenged us to produce a vehicle which can securely transport an eggshell chandelier from the Cooper Hewitt to Whitney. Our group built an AI pink whale drone called “Whaley” and attached the cushioned chandelier container on the end of a firm chain coming out from the bottom of Whaley. We made an AI drone to reduce damages caused by people and traffics. To minimize possible damages caused by the vibration and shaking due to the motor and engines, we kept the container outside of the drone. The case itself can shoot off and land in the destination if the drone malfunctions.
In the subsequent session, the counselors presented the primary design challenge we have to tackle throughout the camp. It was to compose an exhibition inspired by objects from Cooper Hewitt’s permanent collection. Before inspecting the candidate pieces for our display, we went over the general exhibition themes which curators and artists may use. The sample themes we came up with were “country traditions,” “future of electricity,” and “teapots from around the world.” We developed our ideas on “country traditions” theme and discussed what varieties of artifacts and distinct country customs might be suitable: Swedish St. Louis’s day, Korean clothing and lifestyle, and Mexican and Spanish Day of the Dead. Using these backgrounds, after analyzing the photos of the items of the permanent collection, we came up with themes that can correlate to those particular objects: uses of red, function, paper, timeline, connections, cultural connections, emotions of design, contrast, texture, and the genesis of a design. Then we observed the original items with the addressed themes in mind. After learning multiple observing techniques and methods of forming unique relations from the experts, we narrowed down to 4 favored objects for our presentation.
