Developments in post industrial manufacturing systems and the implications for craft and sustainability

Abstract

This paper will discuss how the developments in digital production technologies, when coupled with advances in digital communication and networking, have the potential to transform not only the way things are made, but also underlying business structures, market economies and ultimately the structure of society. The capabilities and possibilities of these technologies will be illustrated through examples in professional practice and in individual research and knowledge transfer projects carried out by the Autonomatic cluster at University College Falmouth. These examples will be used as the basis for questioning the role of craft in new modes of production which integrate sustainable practices and Information Communication Technologies (ICT).

An optimistic vision of future manufacturing is that Digital Manufacturing and ICT will facilitate distributed and localized production, reversing the trend for centralization and urbanization created by the 1st industrial revolution. Rather than completed products being transported across the world from wherever labour is cheapest, digital design data will be sent closer to the customer base, be regionally tailored to local or personal requirements and produced only when needed. Therefore the energy and resources associated with storage and transportation will be removed from a products ecological footprint. Costs will reduce, while diversity and variety will increase and through these changes new business models, based on skilled digital crafting and bespoke production, will emerge.

Whether this vision becomes reality is difficult to judge, and will to some degree be dependent on economic and ecological change. We can already see the broad and significant impact of digital technologies on the way things are made. Within the Autonomatic research cluster at UCF we are exploring ways of integrating digital and hand based making processes and our practice-based research raises questions about the role of craft in post industrial manufacturing scenarios: how can independent makers situate themselves in this future making scenario? Should they situate themselves against this digital revolution, or recognise there are characteristics which digital making and traditional craft making share, and through this make a positive contribution to shaping the ways in which digital technologies can be developed and deployed.