By the beginning of week 4, On the Go had simplified the physical build of our transparent writing wall to the point it was just that – clear glass panels, mounted for writing, with markers provided to participants that could either be returned or taken home.
While more high-tech media capture possibilities remained part of our final presentation (“Fund us and have all this too!”) our practical solution for digital archiving became the participatory medium if social media. Hashtags would be used to collect varied participant photos. Archiving and publicity at the same time? Yes please!
This made the adoption of a project name the crucial design conversation of Week 4. We settled on #WrittenThroughMe, loving the descriptive doublespeak of the language. The hashtags were unused on varied social media platforms (we checked!!). We’d brand pens with the phrase to facilitate participant sharing.
Production of informational text took center stage. Where would we provide written or graphic instructions to visitors? Since we were dealing with the aesthetic novelty of glass as a call to explore, a subgroup headed by Alice and Reese worked on printing decals, laser cutting clear question plaques, and hand lettering. We wanted our into text not only to guide viewers through the logistics of the interaction, but also to inspire and prime the look of their creative actions.
This left one basic but overwhelming engineering challenge for our last few days. How DO we effectively stabilize six plexiglas panels? Although the only feat of engineering left, it proved significant. We had to find ceiling space with ample stability and room for others to walk by, while trying to stay true to our plan for angled surfaces at different depths. Then, planning for an ideal hanging height, and gathering sandbags and weights to create taut stretch between top and bottom. Finally, determining a material for hanging. Wire worked well until we realized we wouldn’t have enough time to secure all our panels with nuts and bolts, and switched to deep sea fishing line.
Naturally, we finished our hang with minutes left to spare before the final presentation of the summer…