SEDIA_2

The future of intelligent living, at the edge

Exploring the future of intelligent living through edge computing, with a stool you can build, train and live with.

Sedia_2 Intelligence Unit set into the timber seat: RGB light, speaker and the chunky learn switch

Sedia_2 is a DIY / AI stool, inspired by Enzo Mari's work "Auto progettazione". Sedia is more than a stool though, it’s a decentralised intelligence, and all it wants in life is to have polite friends that sit on it.

Sedia_2 moodboard: Enzo Mari's Autoprogettazione chair, edge computing boards and voice assistant references

Enzo Mari assembling a Sedia 1 chair from his Autoprogettazione series, the reference behind Sedia_2

Isometric line drawing of the Sedia_2 stool and its intelligence unit

Sedia_2 technical drawings: elevations, cut list and assembly parts

‍All you need to build your own Sedia_2 is some cut timber, screws, a drill and a Sedia_2 Intelligence Unit (SIU). Building the chair reinforces your relationship with the object, and allows you to appreciate its engineering, a given in our post-Mari IKEA world.

The SUI contains 4 elements: 1) An RGB light, 2) A speaker, 3) A chunky learn switch, and 4) An edge computing system with an onboard AI. Teach Sedia_2 to recognise people by talking to it when the learn switch is on. Read it short poems and stories to reinforce your bond, and watch it interact with you as it grows.

Sedia_2 rendered in cut timber with its yellow power cable

Sedia_2 interaction flow: build and power it, activate the learn switch, read it poems, teach it new voices

We believe that AI, just like any other technology before it requires empathic design in order to ensure a more transparent future in which humans will co-exist with intelligent machines. Sedia_2 is a small experiment today, but may be coming to a living room near you very soon.

Building Sedia_2 in the workshop: the timber frame clamped and drilled

Building Sedia_2: fitting the seat boards to the frame

Building Sedia_2: assembling the timber frame and fitting the intelligence unit

The finished Sedia_2 stool in the workshop, cable trailing

LUII open-source Braille learning tablet for kids, by Alexis Bardini

Noones app wallet screen in pixel-art green, Bitcoin super app by Alexis Bardini

Ash AI Pokedex open, showing bee recognition on screen

AstroSafe — safe browser for curious kids ages 4 to 10

ORBITS — phygital artifacts using 3D photogrammetry and hand craftsmanship

SEDIA_2

The future of intelligent living, at the edge

Exploring the future of intelligent living through edge computing, with a stool you can build, train and live with.

THE CHALLENGE

AI is arriving in the home the way every technology before it did: fast, opaque, and asking to be trusted. Sedia_2 asks what it would mean to design it with empathy instead. Make the intelligence something you assemble with your own hands, and you change your relationship with it. It's a DIY AI stool, inspired by Enzo Mari's Autoprogettazione. All you need is cut timber, screws, a drill and a Sedia_2 Intelligence Unit. Building the chair yourself reinforces the bond with the object and lets you appreciate its engineering, which is a given in our post-Mari IKEA world. The unit holds four things: an RGB light, a speaker, a chunky learn switch, and an edge computing system with an onboard AI. Flip the switch and talk to it, and it learns to recognise you. Read it poems and short stories, and watch it respond as it grows.

THE OUTCOME

An ongoing experiment in edge computing, run between FINH, an Oxford PhD and a lumberjack. A small one today, but it may be coming to a living room near you.

Client: Self-initiated
Year: 2022
Sector: Ai, Hardware, Technology
Agency: FINH
Type: Physical
Role: Industrial Design & Creative Technologist
Outcome: ID, IXD, Ai, UX