Student Projects

GEO-STELLAR Helmet

Tyler Sado

The GEO-STELLAR HELMET is a wearable geodesic sensory helmet that is a therapeutic device utilized to calm anxious space travelers. The multi-faceted helmet houses visual projections of our distant home, Earth, and reverberates sounds of Earth to ease the burden of space travel.

We now reside in a futuristic society, where long-distance space travel is seen as a common commodity. The Geo-Stellar Helmet utilizes its visual and auditory functions to ease the minds of space travelers. The visual projections of Earth aid in reminding travelers what “home” looks like to them. In addition to this visual experience, the use of auditory track panning enhances the experience to fully immerse travelers in these projections of “home”.

Spine Defense

Brandon Sado

Spine Defense are wearable devices designed for divers to protect them from undersea dangers on an Earth which has been enveloped by ocean. 

In this future, Earth has been completely covered in ocean due to the increased level of rising tides. The devices react with the environment to sense danger, and through user activation, acts in similar fashion to the spines of a lionfish. Spine defense can conceptually be worn on the forearms, back, and legs. When undeployed, the spines decrease drag, streamlining movement in the ocean, and when deployed, can be used for self defense, but also as a scare tactic against predators

Stimuli Mitigation Helmet (SMH)

Sai Alueta

The Stimuli Mitigation Helmet (SMH) is a wearable device used by the neuro divergent nomads who inhabit earth in a distant future seeking to prevent overstimulation, and panic attacks. The SMH is a head covering that is secured to the face via a frame that protrudes outward 3/4 of a foot in front of the body, with an aperture type door. The space between the users face and the aperture is completely covered so that the user is isolated within the chamber, and has full control over the opening of the aperture which controls stimuli intake to the eyes, nose, and mouth. The aperture/iris design of the door allows different degrees of being open, set by the user to their preference. 


The original design of this piece was a more traditional helmet shape with various small openings and access valves to the different parts of the head, and later evolved into an isolated piece with one central opening. The placement of the aperture, and the frame of the piece was inspired by Walter Pichlers “portable living room” sculpture. Taking from the theme of an isolated user with one single source of stimuli, in the case of the “portable living room” it was a TV feeding specific media, and in the case of the SMH, it’s one source of visual or respiratory intake. 

Environment Responsive Armor

Chaysen Tanaka

Thesis Statement:

Every year, ocean levels rise roughly 0.14 inches. In the hostile unforgiving wastelands of the year 2049, after decades of combating rising sea levels, humanity gets what it wants, but at what cost? Machines created to protect coastal cities now stand above 2.5 kilometers of the ocean surface. Kānaka are now forced to scavenge through hot, deadly territory. 

Environment Responsive Armor (E.R.A) is a wearable device for camouflaging and protecting the last remnants of civilization in different environments using double-sided sequin inspired strips that rotate when triggered by RGB sensors to blend the user into their surroundings, allowing them to transit safely through dangerous territory.

Project Brief:

Every year, our oceans rise around 0.12 and 0.14 inches. Decades before the year 2049, a large coalition of scientists invented a machine to reduce ocean levels. Due to the overuse of such technologies, all oceans lost much of their mass. In these desolate wastes, an organized group called “The Last Kingdom”, descendants of a wealthy independent Hawaiʻi, utilize camouflage to journey and scavenge safely. The Environment Responsive Armor is a piece of tech inspired by the concealing ability of the mūheʻe (cuttlefish). The armor detects nearby color values to rotate colored sequins to blend its user into the terrain. Thanks to its versatility, it has the capability to disguise a lone wanderer or an entire vehicle.

Environment Responsive Armor

Chaysen Tanaka

Thesis Statement:

Every year, ocean levels rise roughly 0.14 inches. In the hostile unforgiving wastelands of the year 2049, after decades of combating rising sea levels, humanity gets what it wants, but at what cost? Machines created to protect coastal cities now stand above 2.5 kilometers of the ocean surface. Kānaka are now forced to scavenge through hot, deadly territory. 

Environment Responsive Armor (E.R.A) is a wearable device for camouflaging and protecting the last remnants of civilization in different environments using double-sided sequin inspired strips that rotate when triggered by RGB sensors to blend the user into their surroundings, allowing them to transit safely through dangerous territory.

Project Brief:

Every year, our oceans rise around 0.12 and 0.14 inches. Decades before the year 2049, a large coalition of scientists invented a machine to reduce ocean levels. Due to the overuse of such technologies, all oceans lost much of their mass. In these desolate wastes, an organized group called “The Last Kingdom”, descendants of a wealthy independent Hawaiʻi, utilize camouflage to journey and scavenge safely. The Environment Responsive Armor is a piece of tech inspired by the concealing ability of the mūheʻe (cuttlefish). The armor detects nearby color values to rotate colored sequins to blend its user into the terrain. Thanks to its versatility, it has the capability to disguise a lone wanderer or an entire vehicle.