We’re pleased to announce that the Interactive Architecture Lab will be exhibiting our 3m tall spherical garden robot Hortum machina, B at this years Ars Electronica Festival in Linz. The project was shortlisted for the prestigious STARTS Prize https://starts-prize.aec.at

Hortum machina, B is part of the reEarth Project led by William Victor Camilleri (MT) and Danilo Sampaio (BR), and supervised by Ruairi Glynn. Parametric Design and Fabrication was supported by William Bondin, Francois Mangion, and Thomas Powell.

About Hortum machina, B

Harnessing the collective intelligence of plant behaviour, the reEarth project explores new forms of bio-cooperative interaction between people and nature, within the built environment. While plants lack a nervous system, they can, much like animals, become electro-chemically stimulated by their surrounding environment. Through the study of plant electro-physiology, we have wired their primitive ‘intelligence’ into the control-loop of an autonomous robotic ecosystem. Half garden, half machine — a new cybernetic lifeform we’ve named Hortum machina, B.

http://two.wordpress.test/lab-projects/reearth