Knitted Bio-Material Assembly

Bio-fabrication of materials opens up novel opportunities for designers to innovate the functional possibilities of the designed output through variations in fabrication processes. Literature has seen an increased interest in this emerging material design practice that has recently been defined as “growing design” (Myers 2012). Our research work expands on the definition of this emerging material design practice to engage digital design and fabrication procedures in the intersection of biology, craft, and design. The aim is to cultivate a new material type—knitted textile mycelium composite that has the capability to augment final material composite properties and provide formal freedom to designers. 3D CNC knitting enables the fabrication of knitted textile that has control over the specificity of each knit loop, opening up design possibilities to grade functional differentiation when the knitted textile is used as a sacrificial mold for the cultivation of mycelium composite. The research presents various design-to-fabrication workflows that facilitate working with the indeterminate nature of 3D-knitted membrane and the dynamic nature of cultivating mycelium composite growth. Two architecture-scale prototype units were fabricated and cultivated, demonstrating the range of design freedom for this new material type.