NuVu Studios
NuVu is a full-time innovation school for middle and high school students. NuVu’s pedagogy is based on the architectural Studio model and geared around multi-disciplinary, collaborative projects. We teach students how to navigate the messiness of the creative process, from inception to completion by prototyping and testing.
NuVu Studio Model
NuVu’s pedagogy is informed by the architectural design Studio where a coach guides students in hands-on problem-solving to solve complex, comprehensive problems. The Studio model uses exercises to build skills and integrates students’ knowledge in a final project. Within each multidisciplinary Studio, students explore problems rigorously by focusing on one project for a semester. A Studio Coach mentors students to develop their project through an iterative process over the course of the Studio. Students confront the small and large contexts within problems as they are exposed to complex, ‘messy’ situations. The NuVu Team continuously evaluates students through deskcrits and final reviews.
Develop Real-World/Solutions For The World
Taught within the multidisciplinary framework of the design Studio rather than traditional subjects, NuVu students acquire a highly personalized understanding of the world and how they relate to it and can fully participate in it. They develop multiple solutions to problems and learn the importance of moving from one solution to the next, combining, exploring and thinking of the possibilities. They also learn how to change their perspective on an issue quickly. They learn that solutions depend on perspective, and only by understanding an issue from multiple perspectives can they fully explore the terrain of possibilities.
Iterative Process/Constant Feedback
The iterative process, or process of refining an idea, product or solution, in the design studio is intended to provide students with continual feedback from NuVu Coaches and Staff on performance as well as product. NuVu students also experience working in an intense, feedback-rich environment that provides them with information and support for continuous self-evaluation, reflection, and improvement.
Learn In New Ways
NuVu challenges students to learn in new ways: analytical thinkers are inspired to explore their creative selves, while creative students expand their capacity to think and learn analytically.
NuVuX Innovation Studio @ All Saints Academy, Winter Haven, FL
My story
In the spring of 2017 I was hired on as a NuVuX Design Education Fellow by NuVu Studios to lead the All Saints Academy partnership in Winter Haven, Florida. NuVuX is an initiative of NuVu Studios to bring design, creativity, and innovation inside schools and organizations. Upon coming to NuVu I had no prior training as an educator but can now say that I have taught nearly 23 studios (330 ish students). Despite being trained as an Architectural Designer, I have expanded my skill set to encompass Production Design, Electronics, Fashion Wearables and most recently Virtual and Augmented Reality.
Highlights of the 2018-2019 Academic Year
Taught my first studio and survived.
Partnered with Bonnet Springs Park, Sasaki, Platform Art and Art Research Enterprises to design sensory sculptures to be installed in the park. Two grant cycles have been approved for $150,000 each cycle. Two students selected for the winning design. Piece to be fabricated and installed. Students will be involved in process and be able to visit the foundry shop to help with the fabrication of their design.
Partnered with the Lakeland Magic to design whimsical “fanatic devices” for the die hard super fan.
Inspired students to apply to university for various design/engineering programs
So where does this all mean for the 2019-2020 academic year…
In partnership with Keenan Gray, Design Technology Fellow, both he and I have been planning a range of studios that have amped the students skill sets and pushed concept development and storytelling at the forefront of their studios. With emphasis on AR and VR, we have added a new skill set into their toolbox of communication skills for project delivery. In term one we launched Design Fiction, a studio that asks students what it means to be a visionary and how they can re-imagine the campus of 2049. Right now term we are working with the Lakeland Magic (G League team for the Orlando Magic) to launch AR and VR experiences at their stadium, questioning the leagues ability to connect with their fans. Next term we will be continuing our partnership with with Publix Supermarkets innovation lab to redefine experience in the shopping center of tomorrow and continue making shopping a pleasure.
Design Fiction
co-taught with Keenan Grey [NuVuX Design technology Fellow]
12 week studio; 80 minute classes; 26 students
Brief:
Visionaries are constantly pushing traditional boundaries and redefining norms, questioning how designing without limits can enhance the realities of the future. In the film industry, concept artists design worlds that reach far beyond our perceived reality and bridge visions of alternate realities, worlds of fantasy and wonder.
While traditional campus development is pragmatic in approach, students will consider the potential for new structures, or modifications to existing spaces that are unconstrained by physics. Envisioning a campus of the future, students will question what All Saints Academy could become when the laws of reality are questioned. Students will identify a specific zone of the ASA campus and design an imagined future for that space. What impact will the passage of time, and the advancement of technology, climate, and society have on the cafeteria lanai or football field.
This studio will introduce students to the emerging field of augmented reality as a medium for communicating their ideas. Students will begin their investigations using a combination of analog design and digital composition techniques to envision their ideas. They will physically model these proposals and bring them into the digital sphere using 3D scanning, which enables them to manipulate scale, color, and lighting beyond material constraints. Finally, students will use Unity and Augmented Reality software to share their experience and vision at full scale in real time.
Sensory Sculptures
Brief:
Bonnet Springs Park is an ambitious new 180 acre urban park, currently under construction on the eastern edge of Lake Bonnet. This park is one of the most significant urban interventions taking place in the Central Florida region, and will have a measurable impact on its surrounding community. For the past two years, NuVu and All Saints Academy have partnered with the Park to produce speculative installations and devices to enhance the users’ experience of the Park.
This studio will continue that partnership with an exciting new opportunity to design a sculpture that will be professionally fabricated and installed in the park! Students will visit the future site of the park, meet with designers and artists, and create their own vision of a sensory sculpture that will make an indelible impact on Bonnet Springs Park. Students will investigate the size, scale, materiality, and functional and kinetic possibilities of their sculptural object. At the end of the term, students will develop project proposals, including scale models, from which the stakeholder team will select one project to carry forward for fabrication.
news/press:
Flying Objects (Session 1 2019) _ Cambridge, MA
Co-Taught with Andrew Todd Marcus (Chief Academic Officer)
Brief:
From the latest cars, motorcycles, roller skates, skateboards and trains we’ve got ground travel covered. The three dimensional world of flight offers a universe of possibilities. What kind of flying objects can we design that mimic behaviors or animals or use attributes from nature to innovate on flight. How can we look beyond airplane and helicopter flight to create flying objects that mimic the gliding abilities of winged animals, insects, and birds that re-connect us with the natural world. How about a floating messenger seed from a thousand year old mystical tree that can whisp into the air, travel a distance, and share messages across a network of trees? How about a bee-like flying creature that pollinates our window basket with local wildflowers. What about a hovering manta ray that moves stealthily above ground, recording sounds and gathering information about alien life on Mars? And what about a pair of wings that can be worn by humans to give them flying powers to see from a bird’s perspective!
In this studio, students will be constructing a bio-mimetic flying object. You’ll learn about all the components that make flying objects go zoom: lightweight bodies, motors, batteries, wings, propellers, radio signals, and robotic intelligence. Students will ride the waves of radio frequency and modulation and develop an understanding of flight, design and engineering. Students will experience the hands-on joy of designing, prototyping, soldering, building circuits, and assembling their components to bring to life their nature influenced creation which will zoom away in their (fantastical) world!
Tensile Structures
Brief:
In this course, students will learn engineering and mechanical design principles through the construction of tensile pavilions. These membrane structures will be stretched or woven together to provide comfortable shade for students on the school’s lawn. Throughout the semester, student build teams will work on small-scale pavilion models. These iterations will include physical prototypes as well as digital simulations and 3D algorithmic models. Although there will be digital modelling, the studio will not involve electronics unless there is some sort of spectacle associated following the conclusion of the project. All physical elements will be made analog. The work will culminate in scaled physical models that can express the ideas, giving visuals and representations of what could become a staple piece of the All Saints Academy campus.
THE ESSENTIAL COLLAR
Fall 2018
Fall 2019 _ Elly Evans Open Innovation Studio
Backpack Rack
Spring 2019
Fall 2019
