In their collaboration, Sophia Guggenberger and Eugenia Morpurgo are working on a shoe built from four main components. These parts are produced using bio-based materials produced from resources which can grow on the same polycultural field, thereby taking control of the impact the materials they are using have on the environment during all steps of their lifecycle. This means the shoe can be made solely from renewable resources and these resources can be grown all together in a regenerative polyculture, which allows for enrichment of the soil, limits the use of water and fosters biodiversity. They are proposing to design a sustainable resource management as well as challenging existing strategies for material and footwear production.
Next to the development of a blue print for a regenerative field for the production of the shoes, they are exploring processes and tools of production, mixing craft, industrial strategies as well as digital fabrication, creating flexible processes for flexible products for flexible resources.
In order to create wholesome viable options for production in the future, we need to envision localised processes and rethink the connection between resource and product, so we relate them to each other before either one gets made; field – material – product.
