Born between a 12th Century Abbey and a milk pasteurising factory in rural Dorset, Sebastian Ford takes inspiration from the coexistence of the infrastructural and natural. His works explores topics of ritual, network, infrastructure and landscape, through research, diagraming, speculation and drawing.
His 3rd year studio project focuses on our reliance on a centralised network of services that support our lives, from the growing and distribution of food, to our outsourcing of data processing. The project analyses the far away centres in which these practices occur, out of sight and disconnected from our human experience. It then speculates a future within the former industrial areas of Bristol, in which a new distributed network of community is built. Bringing modern technologies into traditional and ritualistic practice to create connection to what supports us.
No artificial intelligence was used for any generation of work in any project!
A case study of farming practices in Dorset, looking at traditional and experimental farm buildings and techniques, followed by a poetic speculation of a new farm. [photograph above: morning light inside old milking barn]
A study of infrastructure globally, looking at the systems and architecture that support us today through research, analysis and speculation. [drawing above: exterior axonometric diagram of data centre cooling in West-Friesland, Netherlands 52°46'38.2"N 5°01’53.8"E]
By looking at what sustains us we gain a greater understanding of what is within ourselves. [diagram above: abstract diagram connecting us to services through emotion, experience and the laws of physics]
The project proposes a open-ended set of nodes within a former industrial area of Bristol to accommodate making and living. [drawing above: set of isometrics of nodes built on the site, including diagram of centralised and distributed networks]
The nodes within the network perform various tasks, being distributed they move closer to the user and community. [render above: an evening of eating and drinking, a digital render of an interior of a dining room in the network]
As the network and community shift, they must be repaired and serviced. This process becomes ritualised. [render above: a nighttime repair on a broken data processing node, an action of ritual, made on rhino 8 + Twinmotion]
