Into the Future – 001.

The future is full of possibilities and it's ours to imagine. From the future of neighbourhoods and music to transport and entertainment, we have week-long explorations to discover something new and expand our thinking. Mood visuals, conceptual drawings and design help bring some ideas to life. This is the start of a series sharing small moments from the larger journey.

A fully customisable contact lens that protects and enhances.

As a brand designer with a certain style, with work that ends with a particular goal: I set out with two clear ambitions: play with no outcome and push to create work that did not look like mine. After gathering inspiration from the Tate Modern, I reached for my sunglasses, wondering if contact lenses could block out rays. And what if each lens could be fully customisable through an app on your phone? I started to explore.

–– Karun Agimal

A way to feel the music for the hearing-impaired.

How do we create inclusive experiences when so many rely on senses we don’t all have? Inspired by shared moments of bliss and the diversity of my family and community, WAVE explores the joy of a night spent moving to music. Seen through the senses of the hearing-impaired, who understand sound differently. Here, you don’t need to hear sound. Its impact is all around you, from shifting shapes that echo each beat to the powerful pulses of custom-made clubwear. Helping us all get closer to the rhythms that connect us. Sink in, and feel the music.

— Jasmine Walsh

A device that helps you listen to plants’ needs.

It’s never been more important to care for and preserve nature. What if we were able to hear our plants, hear their needs, hear their emotions, we could excel in the effectiveness of growing plants and build deeper relationships with them? GROW becomes an entity that evolves the future of planting. We introduce a Plant Hugger, a product that translates the requirements of our plants into beautifully presented data. It gives our plants a voice, allowing them to call for any needs. It also tracks your plants’ live data, allowing you to keep a close eye on their health constantly.

— Aydin Mustafa

A democratic way to visualise music based on who we are.

We all have different life experiences that shape who we are and what we like. It wouldn’t do the world any good if we were all the same and liked the same things.

Music bonds us and makes us all feel something. Heavy techno can mean a night of escapism to some, while to others, it can be a night of nightmares. Visualising music is an interesting creative experiment to capture and express our different personalities and interests. It can also create a library of artwork to support up-and-coming artists that don’t have the means to create album covers themselves. They can pick and choose what resonates with them through a rich library of different visualisations of music.

— Hollie Sanderson

A music festival composed of the sounds of nature.

Last summer, my flatmate and I went wild camping in the middle of the forest. That night I could not get any sleep because of the unexpected loudness of nature. What I had pictured as a peaceful and silent night outdoors turned out to be a chaotic symphony of rustles, flutters, howls and slithers, which I found mesmerising and at times scary. The speculative project GAIA is rooted in the epiphany of that night. In a scenario of ever more disconnection between humankind and nature, I propose a music festival where the soundtrack is entirely composed of the sounds of nature. I worked on the branding of GAIA festival – like the Greek goodness of the Earth – and composed a techno-nature track celebrating the forgotten wonders of our planet.

— Lorenzo Eynard