These fabric covered sculptures are made by machine embroidery, using stretched fabrics to capture translucent plastic sheets. When released from the frame the tensioned fabric pulls together, making the initially flat plastic pop up into a 3D shape. Both organically curved and angular origami-inspired shapes emerge from the embroidery frame, and the sculptures can be re-flattened for mailing or storage.
What I like most about the process are the mysterious inner spaces that appear between the layers as the stretched fabric contracts around the plastic. In the vase at the right, the pockets create a dichroic effect when lit from inside, and in the origami pyramids at left, the spaces provide room for the facets to fold together for twisting into a flat disk.
The above sculptures start out flat with plastic pieces sewn directly to stretched fabric or trapped in between sewn enclosures:
As the fabric contracts, the plastic pieces get pulled together, the gaps close and the 3D structure forms.
When wire stiffeners are used instead of plastic, these initially flat circles become saddle shapes after the tension is removed:
The shape memory wire in the above design will make it flatten out again when heated, and when the wire cools, the 3D saddle shapes reappear.
By combining both shape memory wire and plastic stiffeners, a twisting limb is formed that snaps into a left- or right-hand configuration. The wire is activated to switch between shapes.
