Client: RAB Lighting Inc.

Overview

ioNature is a kinetic installation used 1500 units of real grass and dried grass to create a 2400 sq ft interactive grass field. When people walk in the field, the grass will respond to people and sway back and forth to form wave patterns, just like walking in the nature field with a gentle breeze.

The new version of ioNature in late September used real wheat instead of grass, to fit in the golden autumn season.

The installation was combining art and technology to explore the question – what will be like in the future when everything is connected?

Goals

Today electric light is starting to become connected to the internet. Computational power is being infused into the light bulb, power lines, waterways and our everyday life. In the future, what will the world be like when IoT technology is everywhere?

IoNature is an exploration of this question. It created an IoT grass field with 1500 units of real grass and dried grass, multiple sensors and controllers. There was a path in the grass field. When people walked along the path, their movements would trigger grasses to wave, as well as nature sounds of the stream, frog, and rain to play.

The installation was designed for a booth in the world’s largest annual architectural and commercial lighting trade show, Lightfair International (LFI). The commissioner, RAB Lighting, is a leading LED lighting manufacturing company committing to creating high-quality, affordable, well-designed and energy-efficient lighting over the past 70 years.

The installation successfully attracted a lot of people to come to RAB Lighting’s booth, to experience the company’s vision of a future connected world, and to learn more about the company’s innovative products. The installation became a hot topic of the trade show and won Lightfair International 2017 Best Booth Award (900 sqft).

Process

IoNature came from an idea of using art installations to show the concept of connected lights.

The client reached to us with a rough idea and we narrowed it down to a clear and executable one. Then we started to do prototyping, designing, part sourcing. And we did assembly along with client’s workforce.

We also did set up in trade show and maintained it until the end of the trade show.