Background

The first workshop of this year will be about biomaterials!

For most of us, mushrooms are an ingredients found on pizza or risotto. But after this workshop, not anymore. With entirely different eyes, you will see mushrooms as a new building material to manufacture objects, furniture and even buildings.
If you think about it, we use living organisms as manufacturing material all the time: furniture is made with trees, clothes with cotton flowers and fur or skin and more. Biotechnology applications are expanding in this area, and now biological organisms can be used to produce new materials or alternatives to old ones, such as bacteria producing paper or even concrete.

In this area, mushroom-based materials are a very promising biomaterial, because of their versatility and flexibility.

This biomaterial is obtained by growing mycelium, the root structure of mushrooms, onto a substrate, in this case agricultural waste, with a little water and flour. In little time, the mycelium colonizes the substrate forming an intricate root-like fibers that bind everything together.
By playing with the type of mushroom and substrate, different performance properties can be achieved to fit a variety of applications, from thick and stiff, to thin and flexible, and it is 100 % biodegradable.

The mushroom material has been used by biologists, designers, artists and makers as an alternative to leather, plastic, as building material, to make furniture and objects like lamp shades, surf-boards and electric guitars. The possibilities are endless!

During this workshop you will get hands-on experience with the Mushroom Material, offered by Ecovative. You will learn how to handle it correctly and use it to grow your own custom object, to take home with you.

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Workshop

The workshop is divided in 2 different parts:

18th of March
In the first part, we will learn how to handle the mycelium and build the custom shapes. The mycelium will then be left one week to grow and colonize the molds.

25th of March
In the second part, we will dry the objects, varnish and decorate them, so that you can bring them back home with you.

We encourage you to bring/build your own mold, to grow an object of your choice. If interested, please get in touch with us beforehand.

Participants

The workshop is open to beginners and experienced bio-intrepids alike. No previous knowledge in electronics or biology is needed, as all the relevant notions will be covered during the workshop.
We would appreciate a small donation (around 12 €) to cover the material costs.
To allow everyone to have hands-on experience on the project, we set the maximum amount of participants to 20.

Facilitator

Dr. Marco Raffaele Cosenza is both an academic biologist and DIYbiology enthusiast. Marco combines his passion for biology, art and new technologies to raise awareness in the general public about the upcoming biotechnology revolution and how biotechnology impacts our everyday lives. He is founder and president of Biotop Community Lab e.V., a community of people engaged in promoting democratization of science and access to biotechnology by hand-on experience and learn-by-doing education.

REGISTRATION

If you would like to take part to the workshop, please register by filling the form here below and click submit. You will then recieve additional information and updates about the workshop. Registration is valid for both days and will help us to have an idea on how many people will join and to prepare enough mushroom material.