Ecology Masks

I created these speculative masks in direct response to the Covid-19 pandemic, inspired particularly by my own return to nature in pursuit of personal health during this time. This project is meant to describe the opportunity provided by this time of pause in society to reevaluate and ultimately strengthen our relationship with the environment. Inspired by the trend of creating DIY PPE, these masks provide a surreal yet honest message for how to seek solutions for wellbeing through mindfulness toward our planet.

Symbiotic Mask

This mask is about having a symbiotic relationship with nature; there is a mutually beneficial, cyclical exchange of essential resources between person and plant. The wearer inhales oxygen produced by the native wildflower in its terrarium, and the plant uses the CO2 exhaled by the wearer. Furthermore, condensation forms inside of the mask and drips down into the soil, watering the plant. The wearer keeps the plants alive: expressing empathy for nature, while benefitting from it as well.

Aromatic Mask

This mask is about developing a meaningful relationship with nature; for the mask to be used, its aroma chamber must be filled with plant matter that the wearer would seek out each day. In doing so, they would build awareness for the nature around them, and then get to breathe in the scents of it as they go about their day. As the use of this product becomes habitual, the wearer must build empathy for their environment by taking steps to ensure sure this practice does not deplete it.

Concept

The initial idea for this project was actually one I had over a year before the pandemic. I was generating ideas for conceptual products for use in performance art; this idea was about a future where exposure to nature is so limited that people use wearables containing plants to combat this deficiency. Serendipitously, the very first idea I’d drawn was for a face mask allowing for exchange of gasses between person and plant. This eventually became the first mask I developed, after adapting the overarching concept to reflect ideas of seeking wellbeing during a public health crisis.

After the pandemic started, I returned to my childhood home in a 60-acre forest to quarantine. This sudden reunion with nature for the sake of health and wellbeing had prompted me to look back at these sketches, as I was seeking an opportunity to use product design to comment on my situation. Once home, two other key experiences rounded out my inspiration for the project. The first was spending a day making DIY PPE out of spare fabrics, and the second was my series of outings into public, where I saw how the pandemic was affecting others.

Fabrication Process

I created the structure for the mask by using recycled materials such as plastic and wire. I then finished it with a casing of naturally-treated deerskin and sinew. This approach takes a strong stance on material politics, in support of environmentalism. The ideas behind this decision embrace the overall goal of the mask: to benefit nature through our action. The combination also provides an intriguing contrast between the raw naturalness of the leather and the clear artificiality of the plastic.

Symbiotic Mask

Aromatic Mask

The plastic and tape construction accounted for most of the structure of the masks, with the exception of the fasteners that made them wearable. Using wire for the straps allowed for a snug cinching of the mask on the face, and a more robust support for the weigh of the chambers. Once these were covered by the sewn and stretched leather, the masks were complete. All that was left was to gather the plants.

Gathering Plants

The next step was to seek out the plants; I knew I wanted to use native wildflowers that I’d encountered around the property. For the Symbiotic Mask I chose a single larger wildflower—the indian paintbrush— that was in seasonal decline, while for the Aromatic Mask I chose an abundant wildflower—the prairie fleabane— that occurred more frequently in my surrounding environment.

The Symbiotic Mask was challenging to introduce life into, as I first has to create a foundation of soil into which the living flower would be transplanted. In the pursuit of empathy, I dug up a microcosm of the environment from which I had taken the flower, as opposed to using any normal potting soil. For the Aromatic Mask, I simply picked the tops of flowers as planned and was able to pack the chamber quickly and easily.

Once the masks were filled with their respective plants, they were truly complete. Like all good product design, the form of the masks is in service of their respective functions. One exists as a nurturing environment for exchange of life, while the other acts as a ………

Final - Contextualized

The goal of the masks is to propose the idea that the best path to health is socially promoted mindfulness for the planet, an ecological and communitarian lens for society that forms the idea of a social ecology. In my proposed future that the masks would exist in, this idea is being spread by an environmental health organization that was founded to address the impact of the pandemic on society, as well as on the planet itself. Its mission is to promote naturalist and environmentalist approaches to personal health, in rejection of pre-pandemic anthropocentrism. And in this instance, the way it promotes this goal of social ecology is with a viral campaign displaying the masks. Its content highlights the steps taken by a particular family of rural craftsmen, who made and use the Symbiotic Mask and Aromatic Mask to connect with and nurture the environment around them.

ECOLOGY PART 1: SYMBIOTIC MASK

The idea that people’s health and the health of the planet are intertwined is something that needs to be communicated to society differently. The concept of symbiosis—things living in a harmonious exchange to survive—is a beautiful way to do so. This mask provides the wearer an opportunity to seek out their own survival by helping a piece of nature survive; It represents a maturation of the basic empathy promoted by the Aromatic Mask.

ECOLOGY PART 2: AROMATIC MASK

The departure from a totally human-centric view of safety and health during a pandemic is a difficult thing to communicate. People need an accessible and regimented entryway into this pursuit. This mask provides the wearer with an opportunity to seek out nature and easily use it to their advantage. Over time, this practice would become habitual and hopefully foster a deeper appreciation for nature in whatever form it takes around us.

I supplemented the primary communication pieces with a few key images of the masks in use, meant to highlight their specific contexts more clearly. For the Symbiotic Mask, this meant a shoot with the wearer surveying the nature around them they are dedicated to fostering. The Aromatic Mask, meanwhile, is shown as something more easily worn as the wearer goes about their essential activities in public, after filling the mask with plants.

Speculative-19.com

I initially contributed this project to a collection of other speculative design charrettes created by myself and two other designers—a website we decided to call Speculative-19. The overarching theme of the projects was to represent hypothetical design interventions to address the effects of Covid-19 pandemic. To quote the About page on the site, “EACH CHARRETTE WILL EXIST AS A REPRESENTATION OF A POSSIBLE INTERVENTION - TRULY A FUTURING EXERCISE - EACH CHARRETTE WILL EXIST AS A COMMENTARY ON A CHANGE WE'VE OBSERVED, BY SUGGESTING CHANGE WE PROPOSE - MEDIUM IS CONSTRAINED TO WHAT WE HAVE DIGITALLY OR PHYSICALLY AT HAND”

http://www.speculative-19.com

In advance of the launch and presentation of the website, I created a short teaser video to promote the project and build intrigue around it. The short clip introduces the concept of symbiosis in showing the condensation forming inside the mask as the wearer respires. I uploaded the video to social media and several relevant websites.

Finally, I drafted a condensed presentation of the two masks for the site. In them I describe the problem I was addressing, its background, my solution to it, as well as info like the inspiration for the project. Together, the two pages describe the opportunity I identified for people to respond to the pandemic with a greater mindfulness toward the world around them. The dialogue between them guides the viewer through an entryway into the idea of developing a relationship with nature, and then build to showing an idealized version of what this relationship could look like.