In order to help get the Cai Modeling Materials out into the world so that students and professionals can work more sustainably, I wrote a 48 page book that teaches people how to make the materials while encouraging them to experiment with the recipes.
This is the second part of my Master of Design thesis project. If you have not already, go see the first part, The Cai Modeling Materials.
Home cooks tend to throw out pasta water while chefs save it to thicken and flavor sauces. As designers, we need to be more like chefs who see value in materials we have been taught to see as trash.
Pasta Water for Designers
The book includes tips, tricks, and advice for experimentation. It even includes a recipe for making Cai Board that uses leftover pasta water as a binder.
The book uses two typefaces. The display type, which you see in the title and headers, is called Movement1. It was formed by dancers moving their bodies. I chose it because we need to create movement on these issues of sustainability, accessible education, and the free sharing of knowledge.
The main typeface, which gets used for the text, is Ubuntu2. Ubuntu is a Zulu word and philosophy that means, “I am because we are”. Because of how ubuntu speaks to the power of community, the open source community adopted the name for a distribution of Linux. Considering the deeper meaning of the word and the aspects of my project that borrow from open source ideas and practices, this typeface in particular seemed appropriate.
I don’t want a lack of access or knowledge to be a reason why people don’t participate in green technologies. That is why the book is licensed as a Free Cultural Work under a Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike license1, which means that readers are allowed to reproduce, copy, and distribute the work as long as they give me credit for the original work.
Accessibility is also why the books use multiple recipe formats. The goal is to help reach makers who have different learning styles.
The first format walks the reader through step-by-step illustrated instructions.
The second format offers guidelines for experimentation.
The Pasta Water for Designers eBook was recently released to Kickstarter backers in both accessible PDF and ePub formats. The Kickstarter campaign was funded at 251%. The goal of the campaign was to raise awareness for the Cai Modeling Materials with a diverse set of makers, from designers to hobbyists. The funds are going towards a printed workbook, which is scheduled to be released in September of 2021. The printed workbook will contain expanded content such as extra recipes. See DesigningWithWaste.com for updates on when the eBooks and printed workbooks will be available to the public.
Pasta Water for Designers is the second of four parts of my Master of Design thesis.
See part one, The Cai Modeling Materials.
See part three, Designing With Waste.
See part four, Criteria for Planet-Centric Design for an excerpt from my written thesis and a full bibliography.
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