Loop.ph is a London-based art and design studio that intervenes at an urban scale to re-imagine life in the city. Born in 2003 through the collaboration of multimedia artists Mathias Gmachl and Rachel Wingfield, their shared portfolio explores the intersection of digital and biological materials and environments and has grown to encompass commissions, exhibitions and workshops—with their work displayed in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City and the V&A Museum in London. This laboratorium is additionally engaged in the process of transparent R&D through OpenLoop, their wiki-based project that deconstructs their design process and the technical specifications of their work for anyone interested.
Focusing their energies on the “design and fabrication of ephemeral textile architecture and living environments” they create urban installations that are informed by “ecologically-based parametric design and principles of community engagement.” This expansive ethos heavily informs their process with projects such as Tree Skins, Living Laboratory, Bio Wall and Metabolic Media. Seamlessly integrating biomaterial technologies with urban and natural environments, the team creates visually and mentally engaging interventions, re-imagining urban scenery.
A quintessential project of theirs is Tree Lungs, an urban intervention made in Lille, France, in 2012. This fractal mass of intertwined cables, electronics and light envelops tree branches, illuminating areas of canopies, synchronised to several carbon sensors located in the surrounding park. The environmental data collected by the sensors informs the installation, simulating a ‘breathing’ pattern through interconnected colored lights: a visual interpretation of the environment that is pulsing with life.