This article was taken from the October 2012 issue of Wired magazine. Be the first to read Wired's articles in print before they're posted online, and get your hands on loads of additional content by <span class="s1">subscribing online.
Copying other people's designs is a no-no in fashion -- unless you're ripping off nature itself. "I saw a bird skull and thought it looked like a heel," Marieka Ratsma (below) says. The 27-year-old fashion designer collaborated with architect Kostika Spaho to create this 3D-printed biomimicry shoe.
The heel copies a bird's beak and the front of the shoe is inspired by the differentiated structure of the avian skull, which means the high heel requires less support material.
Ratsma was turned on to nature after reading the work of Claus Mattheck, who investigates the biomechanics of trees and bones. "It got me thinking. You get a lot of smart designs in textiles, but not really in the products."
Ratsma, based in Woerden, the Netherlands, decided to turn the birds' brain-box into an accessory. She sketched some ideas and shared them on the Shapeways 3D printing forum ("3D printing was the only way to create the elaborate structure"), where she met Spaho; the two hashed out the final design over email. "It was a lot of trial and error, because it had to be strong enough to stand on, and I'm not a shoe designer by origin." Ratsma plans to develop the shoe further by working with traditional shoemakers and 3D printing, and eventually take it to market. She and Spaho are setting up a label dedicated to "nature-inspired design". So what's coming in the next collection? "For the shoe, the skull worked great, but I can't imagine it happening for a piece of clothing. I'll get my next inspiration from a whole
different area of nature."
mariekaratsma.nl
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
