FoAM - Kernow

FoAM Kernow is a non-profit organisation founded and run by Dave Griffiths and Dr. Amber Griffiths, and we are one of six collaborative FoAM studios dotted around Europe.

Most of our time is spent on projects to better understand the ecosystems we are part of, enable more sustainable behaviours, design bespoke appropriate technology (things that can be understood, fixed, repurposed, sometimes off-grid or even elephant-proof), reduce inequalities, and help people to develop creative and confident relationships with science and technology.

In practical terms, you’ll find us designing workshops, building hardware and electronics, writing software, creating exhibitions and unusual opportunities, amplifying the voices of our communities, publishing our work, teaching at all levels (from primary to postgraduate), advocating for political change, and giving people a leg-up wherever we possibly can.

We see transdisciplinarity (working outside established boundaries) as the only viable approach to tackling the most pressing problems, and routinely embed co-design and citizen science as essential approaches for encouraging and including broader perspectives. Once you start with a problem and work your way out, disciplines become a bit nonsensical.

Our projects are usually collaborations or commissions working with publicly-funded organisations, so we make all our work freely available through free software, creative commons and open access publications. This means anyone is able to modify or build on our work for their own purposes.

FoAM Kernow's work has been featured on BBC Radio 6 Music, Blueprint Magazine, Official Raspberry Pi Magazine, The Economist, The Guardian and The Wire and has won the Soil Association's innovation award 2014 and the 2011 VIDA award. We have written for The Guardian and The Conversation on the rapid changes happening in research and education.

FoAM Kernow is registered in the UK as a non-profit organisation (Company No. 09073427). You can find our articles of association, and our policy statements on github. Our 2019 activity report is available here.

A selection of current projects from our studio are highlighted below, followed by a list of who's currently working at the FoAM Kernow studio, with all our archived projects, blog posts, events and publications listed underneath:

Multi-Species Sward App

A system to make it easier for farmers to grow and monitor multi-species swards for more sustainable farming, increasing pollinator diversity, improving soil, and resulting in healthier livestock and…

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AccessLab

The AccessLab project aims to improve access to and the judgement of scientific information, through direct citizen-scientist pairings.

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The Great Bower Building Experiment

Bower birds are known for building ornate and impressive structures. We're running an experiment to see how people would build these bowers, given limited materials.

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Viruscraft

Viruscraft is a research project combining tangible interfaces, craft and computer games to explore how viruses jump from one host species to another, working with Dr. Ben Longdon and Dr. Ben Ashby.

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Sonic Kayaks

The Sonic Kayak is a musical and scientific instrument with which to investigate nature. Kayaks rigged with underwater environmental sensors generate live music from the marine world, providing the p…

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Penelope

How can we make tools that help understand the ancient weaver's mind? How she calculated and solved the first recorded mathematical proofs, embedding them in pattern. How do certain forms of tec…

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The Evidence Support Initiative

Placements for science researchers on local councils, to help provide evidence for decision making.

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Midimutant

Made in collaboration with Aphex Twin, the midimutant learns how to program your dx7 synth so you don't have to.

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Activities

Events

Blog posts

Publications