Loop.ph

The studio was founded in 2003 by Rachel Wingfield and Mathias Gmachl to form a new creative practice that reaches beyond specialist boundaries. It was their ambition to establish a totally different design practice, one where designers, architects, scientists could all work together in a playful and experimental environment on meaningful projects that radically re-think the City.

The studio creates spectacular experiences and environments that allow people to dream and reimagine new visions for our future. They explore the role of art and design in public space by working outside of the gallery, museum and laboratory. The studio works with a range of clients on a commission basis, to create brand experiences, public engagement initiatives and deliver talks and workshops internationally.

As creative disciplines merge and mutate, the opportunities for designers to work as urban interventionists and in an architectural context grow. Loop.pH deliver innovative public engagement initiatives that deal with big urban challenges such as food, energy and water with projects such as The Horticultural Spa, MetaboliCity and Energy Futures. As a studio they activate public space through creating environments and experiences that communicate and engage people with science and technology in a positive and enlightening way.  They collaborate with leading scientists and research institutes to communicate current scientific and technological concepts in a broader cultural and social context. Rachel and Mathias have collaborated with the Medical Research Council, The Mitochondrial Biology Unit, The Centre of the Cell, Creative Partnerships, the Shoreditch Trust and the Audi Design Foundation.

Their recent clients include, Nike, Unilever, EDF, Swarovski, Lexus, Belvedere RED, Bloomberg, Audi Design Foundation, Medical Research Council, The Mitochondrial Biology Unit, The Centre of the Cell, Creative Partnerships, The Shoreditch Trust, TED, The Royal Academy, Kensington Palace.

Loop.pH are internationally recognised for:

• Ephemeral & Textile Architecture
• Computational Design & Digital Fabrication
• Responsive Environments & Architectural Light Design
• Applied Design Thinking & Public Engagement Tools
• Sustainability & Eco-mimicry

A frontierswoman for a new field where designers intervene at an urban scale and develop collaborative tools for public engagement and multidisciplinary practices, Wingfield consults on creative strategies and speculative futures for business and the public sector, and gives provocative talks around the world.

Wingfield helps companies identify the key insights that could impact their business and develop ‘brand fictions’ to probe into possible futures.

Her work can be found in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), NY, the V&A Museum, London, Norman Foster's Private Art Collection, Geneva and the Bloomberg Collection, London.

Mathias is internationally recognized for the design and fabrication of ephemeral textile architecture and living environments. Over the last 5 years he has been developing a physical construction method and corresponding parametric design tools to construct curvilinear architectural space that challenges the rigid rectilinear world of conventional architecture. He is a Research Associate at the Royal College of Art, London, and has led workshops at the Rietveld Academy, CITA and the Acadia conference.

Prior to Loop.pH Mathias was a founding member of farmersmanual, a digital media collective that continuously expanded their practice from music concerts to interdisciplinary cultural, aesthetic and political experiments. FM won the prize for New Media at the Montreal International Festival of New Cinema and New Media, 1999, and presented at Ars Electronics 1997, NTT/ICC Tokyo 1999 and the Venice Biennale, 2001.

Specialities:

• Computational Design
• Digital Fabrication
• Advanced Geometry
• Textile Architecture
• Place Making