7Hacking Households

Open Call, 13 February 2014
Traditional household appliances are created as a closed system; when something goes wrong, the most cost-effective solution is to throw out the appliance and replace it with something new. In an age when 3D printing and DIY circuitry make industrial processes accessible to any individual, this team will build upon users’ newfound abilities and opportunities to repair, customize, modify and repurpose existing products, creating a family of appliances designed for disassembly, repair, and modification.

Reaction, 2 July 2014
What if products were produced the way software is developed? Creating software has become a flexible, collaborative, and adaptable process: projects develop as code that is openly shared, reviewed, adapted, and distributed. Simultaneously, producing home appliances is increasingly dependent on inflexible standards of production leading to a difficulty of repair, less adaptability, and more waste. With Programming Objects, a system emerges in which products can evolve, adapt to your own needs, be reused, and communicate with one another. Objects can now be designed, developed, and produced democratically, rather than through a top-down approach from corporation to consumer.