Timelab.org

Biomaterial production
with the ecosystem in mind

If making isn’t just a solitary act, but something that emerges from relationships: between people, materials, nature, heritage, the digital and analogue, across time and space, then making is by nature a shared, open-ended growing experience.

Fiber Fever Summercamp 2025 brings together engineers, artists and designers to create hybrid forms that merge traditional and digitally crafted biomaterials.

Over the course of 10 intense days, 15 participants come together to work, eat, sleep, and play, forming a temporary community. They gather around 4 focal topics on the production of biomaterials, taking the entire ecosystem in mind.

- How to deal with unpredictable resources in standardized production?
- How to build an open, adjustable process that is still viable?
- What is the impact of biodegradability on the value of the application?
- How to create a inclusive workspace for biomaterial production?

Join us on Tuesday 26 August at 18:00 till 21:00 for an open-evening showcasing the methods and works-in-progress of the Summercamp participants.

Relating to emerging themes of temporality of material and unintentional resources, participants formed 3 working groups:

Netelsteen

Looking to single use products from festivals, events, we are exploring the value of the ephemeral and how localised resources and processes can integrate these objects into the existing ecosystem.

Rippling Biostuff

How do we define an unpredictable resource? What is resource and what is waste? Where is the boundary between available materials and usable materials? Do we consider harmful, toxic, or invasive substances more available than others?
Through questioning, we are developing a methodology to explore how the availability of materials impacts production and making. We aim to create an archive of experiments developed during the Summercamp and activated throughout the city.

Flaws as Features

Flaws as Features explores properties of biomaterials that are traditionally considered undesirable. Starting from the temporality of biodegradable materials, our group is investigating through scientific and artistic enquiry the unique behaviours of a range of materials. These include the tendency of water based pastes to warp during the drying process, and natural dyes to fade over time. How can we approach these commonly unwelcome flaws as opportunities for more sustainable and purposeful use of materials?

Our physical space is more than just a building - it is a place to facilitate prototypes, new ideas, and encounters. During the open evening, participants will continue working between the makerlab, bio-lab, kitchen, and garden. You are invited to discover the unique space and enter into dialogue with the group.

History

Fiber Fever is a series of summercamps within the framework of Timelabs summercamps since 2009. Timelab team developed a format of intens gatherings that bring together designers, artists and engineers in reciprocity. To know more about how, read the blog and manual.

From 2009 until 2016 these summercamps were mainly focused on individual creations towards an end presentation that helped the artists to present in front of an audience of curators. From 2016 on, a group of artists (sprinters) redefined the format towards a more commoning approach. They questioned the competitive and individual focus and drafted a series of uncommon formats for summercamps.

From 2022 until 2025 the summercamps are taking again a new turn. Building upon the knowledge of organising over 10 years of summercamps, Timelab invited a group of affiliated designers and engineers to co-organise the camp. This series is called Fiber Fever and focuses on the topic of fibers (textiles and composites), which connected the format to the ongoing project of Critical Biomass (previously called Knotplex and Knotfactory)