The Materiality of Wearable Computers – Craft and Authentic User Experience

This paper presents work undertaken as part of the author’s ongoing doctoral research into Wearable Computers, and the processes for designing personal digital artefacts that exhibit materiality. Materiality is discussed in its associations with contemporary craft, and as a means by which tools may cease disappearing in the obsessively rational quest for what Heidegger called readiness-to-hand, and instead become more meaningful for users as objects in interaction. The overall aims of the research are to investigate evidence for the growing desire for authentic experience in everyday life, and to evaluate craft practice for its possible contribution to new design and build processes that can deliver this authenticity. Introduction The research this paper describes spans two main fields of activity – the arts, and human-computer interaction (HCI). It is differentiated from much of the writing disseminated through arts channels in that it does not concern the use of computers, new media or programming in the production of art works. Simultaneously, it is unusual in the HCI community for its basis in arts practice. Much has been said about the nature of craftsmanship as computing technology becomes available to the practitioner, but little has been said regarding the role of the craftsman’s sensibility in the development of computational products. The aim of this paper then is to draw