Lucky Break

Client: Super Duper Studio (self initiated)

Material: Hand blown glass

Programming Languages: Processing

Role: Design lead, prototyping, software, fabrication management

Industrial Design: Matthew Johnson
Poster/Logo Design: Praree Kittidumkerng
Glass Fabrication: Glow Glass Studio
Mold Fabrication: Blockhead Tools

How do you maximize the advantages of an artisan production process?

At Super Duper Studio, most of our work uses craft-based production methods. If we were going to use that approach to fabrication, as industrial designers, we were interested in figuring out how to make the most of it. Mass production lends itself to inexpensive, uniform goods, while bespoke production affords the opposite.

Lucky Break is a family of hand-blown, mold-formed glassware made with a repeatable procedure which gives every vessel its own unexpected and unique color composition. The colors warp, twist, and flow as the molten glass is shaped ensuring each piece is impossible to replicate. A perfect balance between design, engineering, and craftsmanship.

No Two Ever Alike

I realized, a repetitive production process is very similar to a piece of software. So, if we wanted to make each piece unique instead of the same, the question became, how do we introduce some randomness into the "code" without it breaking down? Instead of carefully composing each pattern, we developed a system for selecting colors using a psudo-random number generator I programmed and applying them to the outer layer of the molten glass. As they melt, the colors warp and twist providing infinite possible outcomes.