Biomaterials Workshop

The Biomaterials working group will show you how to create materials recipes from locally abundant ingredients from our earth's living systems. In this two-part workshop, we will share documentation standards so that your recipe can be replicated and iterated upon by participants in the working group, and work with "cooked" materials to turn them into beautiful and useful things. Previous materials have included agar, glycerin, tumeric, used coffee grounds and clam shells! This is a two-part workshop, so please RSVP for each session (yes, you can sign up for just one session if you can't make both):

January 26 (RSVP this page): create materials from used coffee grounds, sea shells, and fruit skins.

Febrary 9 (RSVP this page): transform the materials from Jan. 26 by using fabrication tools to create beautiful and useful things such as reusable bags, tiles, and molds. We'll show you how! This workshop is open to everyone with an interest in saving the planet, creatively. More about Biomaterials Working Group: Fablabs around the world use tons of plastic, imported wood, and other materials with a substantial carbon footprint -- for single-use purposes. Even though some (small bits) of it can be recycled, that process is energy intensive and often requires inputs of virgin materials. What if we could make our own consumables that were biodegradable and sourced almost literally from our backyards? Over the next several months, the Biomaterials working group will be sampling, refining and documenting recipes using ingredients local to Boston. We’ll collaborate with other similarly minded groups who are undertaking the same challenge in their corners of the world. Our process will be an experiment in community-based science and will culminate in applying our materials to a public art project in Boston next summer. The working group is open to anyone who is interested in pushing forward sustainable materials in a collaborative way! Check out a sampling of biomaterials recipes at Materiom.com.