How can technology transform the human body Lucy McRae

I call myself a body architect I trained

in classical ballet and have a

background in architecture and fashion

as a body architect I fascinate with the

human body and explore how I can

transform it I worked at Philips

Electronics in the far future design

research lab looking 20 years into the

future I explored the human skin and how

technology can transform the body I

worked on concepts like an electronic

tattoo which is augmented by touch or

dresses that blushed and shivered with

light I started my own experiments these

were the low-tech approaches to other

high-tech conversations I was having

these are q-tip stuck to my roommate

with wig glue I started a collaboration

with a friend of mine bot Hess he

doesn’t normally look like this and we

used ourselves as models we transformed

our apartments into our laboratories and

worked in a very spontaneous and

immediate way we were creating visual

imagery provoking human evolution whilst

I was at Philips we discussed this idea

of a maybe technology something that

wasn’t either switched on or off but in

between and maybe that could take the

form of like a gas or a liquid and I

became obsessed with this idea of

blurring the perimeter of the body so

you couldn’t see where the skin ended in

the near environment started I set up my

studio in the red-light district and

obsessively wrap myself in plumbing

tubing and found a way to redefine the

skin and create this dynamic textile I

was introduced to robin the swedish pop

star and she was also exploring how

technology coexist with raw human

emotion and she talked about how

technology with these new feathers this

new face paint this Punk the way that we

identify with the world and we made this

music video I’m fascinated with the idea

of what happens when you merge biology

with technology and I remember reading

about this idea of being able to

reprogram biology in the future away

from disease and aging

and I thought about this concept of

imagine if we could reprogram our own

body odor modify a biologically enhancer

and how would that change the way that

we communicate with each other or the

way that we attract sexual partners and

would we revert back to being more like

animals more primal modes of

communication I worked with a synthetic

biologist and I created a swallowable

perfume which is a cosmetic pill that

you eat and the fragrance comes out

through the skin surface when you

perspire it completely blows apart the

way that perfume is and provides a whole

new format it’s perfume coming from the

inside out it redefines the role of skin

and our bodies become an atomizer I’ve

learned that there’s no boundaries and

if I look at the evolution of my work I

can see threads and connections that

make sense but when I look towards the

future the next project it’s completely

unknown and wide open I feel like I have

all these ideas existing embedded inside

of me and it’s these conversations and

these experiences that connect these

ideas and they kind of instinctively

come out as a body Architects I’ve

created this limitless and boundless

platform for me to discover whatever I

want and I feel like I’ve just got

started so here’s to another day at the

office