Exploring memory, impermanence, and material storytelling through discarded flowers.
Pressed in Bloom is a design research project that reimagines floral waste as a vessel for memory. Rooted in emotional sustainability, the project explores how design can preserve the fleeting beauty of flowers gifted for love, loss, or celebration, transforming them into tactile, biodegradable surfaces that hold both form and feeling.
Through extensive experimentation, I explored various natural binders such as agar, carrageenan, guar gum, and starch, along with ingredients like lignin fiber, glycerin, calcium carbonate, and calcium chloride. Each test focused on achieving the right balance of flexibility, strength, shrinkage control, and aesthetic clarity, particularly the terrazzo-like visibility of flower fragments.
Rather than hiding the material’s origins, the outcome celebrates them. Each surface captures the petals' textures, colors, and delicate imperfections themselves, offering a quiet archive of what once bloomed.
Pressed in Bloom asks how we might design with care, remembering that some of the most meaningful things in life are temporary and still worth preserving.
When Petals Fall
A suspended composition of flower-infused biocomposite discs, this mobile captures a fleeting moment - the quiet fall of petals after their bloom. Each piece holds traces of memory, color, and scent, preserved just before being lost. As the elements shift with air and light, the work reflects on impermanence, preservation, and the beauty of what remains.
Choosing the bouquet
Dehydrating the petals
Stems for fiber and structure
Petal preparation: ground and shredded
Experimentations: varying binders, ratios, and petal preparation type
