Designing a library of affective touches
As part of our NAVET for Students initiative, we are excited to host Henrique Sambi's workshop 'Designing a library of affective touches', exclusively as part of Konstfack Research Week 2025! Read more to know about the details of the workshop below.
Description
Touch can convey comfort and love, but also warning and fear. It's universal, but also highly subjective to cultural norms. What does a touch mean here in Sweden? Does it mean the same in Brazil? Remove one of the humans, and we get to a more complex question.
That's the exploration we do during the workshop. During a 2-hour-long session, we invite participants to co-create soft robotics touch patterns, thinking about the texture, the placement on the body, the rhythm, and the strength.
Each group of participants create their own touches, using inflatable pads, the groups decide how they want the pad to be, maybe a soft layer of fabric, or nails, to create an alarming touch. After, we save those touches into a touch library, created for this project, that allows other users to access and test this collection of touches that we are co-creating together.
This workshop is for people who want to think about ways that technology can live close to the human body. It's not a tech session, we spend more time doing things with our hands than interacting with computers.
Practical information
When and where does the event happen?- Jan 31st 10:00-12:00, at Konstfack, LM Ericssons Väg 14, 126 27 Hägersten
How many people can attend? - Max 30 people
Are there any requirements to attend? - No specific background knowledge or expertise needed. Its important that at least one in every 5 participant has a computer
Do not hesitate to get in touch at navet-centre@kth.se if you have any questions!
Host information
