Carbon Offsetting my trip to India

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Essence of Hair: Organic // Cave 2

We got the possibilities of individual denser hotspots and the surface covering of the hair cave, for a heat insulating primitive architectural habitat. How could I use the organic property of hair to provide an additional element to the overall concept or as a decision-tool to reformulate the function change according to the conflict between the existing possibilities?

To do this, I want to define what organic means here. Organic can mean several things, but in my case, I would like to pick out the meaning of “organically growing” or “organically adapting” because The underlying theme of movement and adaptation, which is change over time that serves a temporary need. This change could be incorporated into the living environment of the hair cave, to improve the living situation inside my room.

By applying this, it would mean not EVERY surface would be covered. There would be hotspots of density in terms of insulation in places where I am often and a reduced density where the insulation is unfavorable e.g. a working desk.

Going back and forth in a way of organic transition between the architectural   elements and my “most visited” places of my room, the shape becomes something like a waved, flexible second skin that is somewhere between the second and third shell of human protection. An intermediate architecture that allows free movement, but provides a dense network of heat-capturing surface, while still offering enough flexibility for everyday life and work.

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Essence of hair: Insulation //Cave1

The following posts are going to go deeper into the separate points of “essence of hair” and connecting them to an architectural environment.

Hair is isolating. going back from animal hair  to human hair and it’s function regarding heat, (leaving pubic hair out) there is are two obvious findings the whole human body is covered, but the head is covered the most. I could not find out if this circumstance is attached to the physic of rising heat and keeping the heat loss for the whole body to a minimum by blocking the heat from escaping the most upper part of the body. OR if the head has the most hair to only protect itself (not the whole body) from energy loss because it has the most perfusion/ blood flow. (being densly irrigated/ supplied with warm blood) The question here on an abstract level is if the body works with

autonomous parts that “decide” for themselfes if they need to protect them from heatloss OR as a closed system when it comes to heat preservation, that sees heat distribution by warm blood & the pressure needed to distribute the heat, as well as oxygen and nutritients as a net-sum physic.

For the cave it would mean that I would either need heat several autonomous “islands” that need the most protection as e.g. because I stay there the most time, OR if it is better to see the whole room as a system, that just needs protection of heat loss, where the “risk” of losing heat is the highest (like the idea with the modules)

So when transfering these insights to my room and finding concrete solutions that could mean: detached cocoons that are more close to the body, resembling clothing than to architecture on the one hand and a surface covering layer that is approximating an architectural element.

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What is the essence of hair ?

I googled a little into all the different kinds of hair, to broaden my perspective about what it is, that makes hair - hair.

Since my rug is already a mixture of human and sheep hair, i startet looking into nature, re-discovering spiky hair of hedgehogs, hollow hair of polar bears that trap light, and all kind of fibers used by man.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1082186/Polar-bear-hair-loo-roll-Shark-skin-cheese-grater-Welcome-animal-kingdom-extreme-close-up.html

Collecting all the thoughts on hair from my work before, there are a few general findings now that will help me finding a shape that would express the task I want to achieve as well as living up to the materials core properties. These properties do not only include physical mechanics, but also imply social and historical connotations.

hair is isolating & protecting of heat loss

hair is organic, nonconform & irregular,

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Hair Modules Pros and Cons

By prototyping insulating hair modules, that could be reproduced in a mechanical manner, the Idea of an inside turned second skin that forms a cave, could be communicated and represented more tangibly. At first I liked the idea of the modules, because of this ability to scale. Through the multiplying it could stimulate inspirations of where to go with the material, letting creativity lead the way for exploration.

On a second thought, this scaling would only mean scale on a materialistic level, not an concept level and a systematic level. In short: the idea was too much product like. This resemblance to a product that could be on the market, makes it lose a little bit of its charme. Firstly because it adds a economic element, which is not fitting for a material of this abundance and that is largely available for free. Through this restriction into a fixed shape, a similar thing happens, it denies the flexible nature of hair. It suggests a “finished” developement, neglecting further possibilities, beyond the module itself.

To summarise: the hair module is lacking reflection on the essence of hair itself, that would drive the concept. The cave in contrast has still a promising overall feeling to it, that would serve what I want to achieve with the hair in the project.

Following these thoughts, I tried to get a better hold on to the essence of the material hair.

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Modules for a Cave

My first Impulse was to make a module, that could be attached to surfaces that would loose a lot of heat. Breaking the idea of Insulation down to creating a module, made it at first more appealing to communicate an idea. But having this image of a room, covered in hair in my head, I asked myself:

What would be he implications of a cave out of hair?

What I liked about this idea, was the diving into a environment, that is so unfamiliar, same as the material hair itself. It would emerge you in a whole new feeling of space, one of isolation, such as a cave itself. It would dampen the sound, giving the “cozyness” of warmth a layer on another sensory level (this point reaches a little bit back to the deeper voice excercises I was doing the last few weeks) An overall Idea of organic living, close to “nature”, that is being cought in a fight between creeping coldness and the human ingenuity as a way to mitigate harsh conditions. By a whole surrounding, an immersive feeling would be stimulating for the acceptance or at least a impulse for thoughts about the material.

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It has been a while...

Since I was engaging in something with hair for the project. There were several reasons why this was neglected a little

1. scaling up the production would need a lot of time, which I didn’t have 2. warmer weather and therefore being tricked into not thinking about taking  action for heat insulation 3. I got visit from family who brought me additional blankets and warm clothes (I can go to sleep without shivering now) 4. but the main reason was the impossibility to mee the expectations of my visions. It was blocking me from going forward, because the original plan was impossible because of reason 1.

BUT, I am still intreagued by the material and the assignment as it has been up to now. I see a similar approach in method acting from movies; translated to design in my case - if I FEEL the cold in my room, I actually have to DO something about it. Because by the time it will be really cold I have to have something prepared  - long term thinking is something designers should be able to to anyway.

So where to go from here? I got feedack from my tutor, on these matters and at one point there was a clear statement “hair deserves a weird approach, because it it such a neglected material throughout human history”

The assignment acknowledges the fact, that offsetting this amount of carbon is not possible. It was more to be seen as a motivation, rather than a restriction. With this in mind, I decided to extract some points of the things written above to focus my work: Seeing that the impossibility from point 4. feeds into the opportunity for a weird approach is opening the project to a somewhat speculative direction. In a sense that It should definitely be possible to realise the idea itself right now with the right means, but acknowledging the fact that it’s not managable from my current point of ressources. The outcome could be a small modell of the idea.

Secondly If I want to get the max out of the material, I need to explore what it makes it that particular material. So thinking and investigating in the material will help me finding a shape that fit’s the concept and not the other way round (would mean - force-fitting the material onto an object, like I did until now - a rug)

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My help-line for the worm box

https://wurmkiste.at/richtig-kompostieren/

I used this link to get to know more about how worm-composting works. It’s in german though, but the illustrations speak for themselves anyway. Super helpful (Y)

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Cooking with electricity

Intermediately something that has nothing to do with worms or human hair:

I started cooking on our electric toaster.

Our normal stove is running on gas, so I try to heat as much as possible with this thing I found in our shared flat. It would not pay off buying one for myself because I’m only here for half a year, but if it’s already there - why not. Impossible are of course fluids, soups and so on..

but:

was pretty good :D

I don’t know yet, if our electricity is importet e.g. by german coal-plants, but it’s at least the better alternative than the gas which I am sure is fossil natural gas.

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No Methane

Even, if the overall heat which gets added by the compost box is not huge,it has another positive level of impact on my carbon emissions total.

Because of methane that is produced when organic substances in residual waste start to rot without oxygen, landfills are a big emissionpoint.

Also because Methane is more climate active than CO2 number-nerds: about 25 times as climate potent as CO2), saving methane production by not disposing organic waste together with residual trash is helping my carbon offsetting goal a lot - how much? I would have to research... By giving the organic waste to a compost, the microorganisms dissassemble the matter and produce CO2, which is at least the second best alternative. but actually the best alternative there is...

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I bought a thermomether and I’m living with wiggly pets now...

A few days ago I finally built my wormbox for my advanced organic waste collection.

from small to big, my compost facilties are growing.

The wormbox:

I knew, that the process would take ages if there would be no additional help, so worms were needed. Since there was no hardware store or garden center in Eindhoven, I had a look into pet-shops and after a unlucky search, also considered ordering them online. The thing is - online they would have cost me over 30€. A little bit too expensive for my worm-budget this month. The nearest garden center was located in Nuenen, a neighboring village of Eindhoven, so I called them if they had worms in stock - no luck either. BUT at least they got compost bacteria, which I thought would be good to kickstart the process, so I went there. And I found out, these bacteria are really important, because they help with the process of breaking down organic waste. As they decomposit the material, they create food for the worms to eat, so they live in symbiosis. Finally, I found a small box of worms in a fishing supply store.

After a few layers of carbon-high material (cardboard & leaves), followed by some nitrogenrich material, a starting population of red wigglers (Eisenia Foetida), covered again with some compost material.

Looking at the picture on top of the post: The most right one is the worm box just a few days after starting. You can see how dark  the material it is in comparison - that means, the worms eat already a lot and transform food into compost.

And the plan, like I had in the beginning with producing heat with living organisms, worked! The average temperature is about 2 degrees higher inside the box, than it is outside (which makes a huge difference from 17 degree celcius, which is too chilly to walk around without sweater to 19 degree, which is almost like a day in spring). So I get added 2 degrees celcious constantly to my room temperature, sure it cools down quickly, but overall it works!

Also you notice the heat goes up, every time the bacteria get their right conditions, meaning after turning the waste and therefore adding oxygen, and after adding water, meaning space for them to distribute and expand their “territory”

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Infrared camera- that’s the word..

I just remembered how these things are called haha.

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I started making insulation material that could catch and retain warm air, and yes, what you see is human hair. The white parts in it are sheeps wool. I inteded to make felt out of human hair only but the composite of both is necessary to mat.

But the technique is astonishingly low level, you need a square brush and a small tool with some needles, you punch the fibers that you lay on the brush and they start creating a surface. I invested 5 hours and got a surface aproximately 40x60x1.5 cm, made by hand. The area is not the problem, but the thickness is the time-consuming part, but also the necessary if I want it stiff and insulating //

Right now it looks more like the fur of an unhealthy cat or a dustball from the desert, but that’s mainly because of the white wool fibers - i somehow thought that would look cool. So next time I’ll use some colors maybe.

Some other things to consider for me are the whole range of textile choices: should I just make one  thick surface? more surfaces and sow them together? should I try giving it a pattern (I already tried to create kind of a marble texture -picture2)?  or cutting it in stripes and roll them in like a hose? 3 dimensional shapes like bricks?

I think the underlying question of the range above is more where it is smart to put it - best would be probably as close to either to: the body OR the weak spots in insulation in my room ( I always wanted to buy a heat-detection gun with one of those red-to-blue screen where red is hot and blue is cold)

And for the systemic part: I asked some hairdressers for hair, but soon realized the hair is just a bulk of really unhomogenous material. For this quick prototype this isn’t a problem because it actually helps experimenting with different materiality like thick, short and sturdy stumps as a filler for small pockets, which fall out easier or long flowing hair without much friction or curls etc etc. In fact - if you want those materialities develop their full potential you would have to collect different colours, curls or something else and also cut them in a way you don’t loose too much length. That would mean more precise cutting and planning ahead of single cuts of strands - so completely new teaching for hairdressers even.

probably more on that topic later on. Soon I will upload my first tries to lower my voice, I tried already and made some recordings, but couldn’t process it - stay tuned

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Borrowed a book from the library at my universtiy: A good read about material design research !

there’s a part dedicaded on body materials like hair, shit and dust -exactly my topic! “Waste human hair, generally cut off and discarded, is showing new potential. This bountiful resource has high tensile strenght, is a good insulator and can be made into functional objects [...] As long as the world is populated by humans, human hair will remain an abundant, easily available resourse. Hair is strong yet biodegradable, and completely sustainable and natural.”

-Radical Matter, Kate Franklin and Caroline Till, 2018, London

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NOT ENOUGH!

This is how I calculated how much energy I am saving by not turning on the heat .

I used several websites for doing this, and in several steps, I wonder if there would have been an easier way, but his is how I did it. Also I am doubting that the result is 100% accurate, because a lot of the factors (like insulation inside a wall,) are averaged by the websites, no specifications were possible, and the factors of conversion as well as the results differed from website to website (i tried out quiet a few...).

FIRST: measuring the room, tell the website what kind of rooms are above or below the room, tell the insulation and windows, you get the --> needed BTUs/h to heat the room: 1458 BTU/h (https://www.bestheating.com/btu-calculator)

SECOND: multiply by 24 hours to get the full amount of energy you need to heat the room for one day: 34 992 BTUs

THIRD: convert the number of needed energy to potential volume of natural gas: 0.971 cubic meter of natural gas (per day) to heat my room (https://www.abraxasenergy.com/energy-resources/toolbox/conversion-calculators/energy/) FOURTH: multiply by the days until india trip, this is today conveniently 60 days: 58,26 cubic meter of gas

FIFTH: converse the volume of carbon emission for this amount of gas into kilogramms: 0,714 times 58,26: 41,5964 kg (https://www.answers.com/Q/How_many_kilograms_in_one_cubic_meter_of_natural_gas)

Result:

I'm saving 41,5964 kg of CO2 by not heating my room until december

That’s not a lot, but how does this number change when I insulate my room better?

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My first start to make an indoor compost collection, having a hard time finding a balance between “green” (nitrogen-rich) and “brown” (carbon-rich) ingredients.

Kitchen scraps are most of the time more nitrogen-rich. I might have to add some worms, also - I guess this will be a constant improvement into more advanced “buckets”

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Thanks, I guess

Starting to appreciate good weather in autumn more. relinquishing heat is not fun and easy as I thought.

I’m super happy for the last few mild days, I could even open my window and have a normal amount of fresh air lol