Lea Albaugh

AboutRSS

A design fiction proposal to ease navigation of the urban condition described in China Miéville’s novel The City & the City. In the geographically intertwined cities of Beszel and Ul Qoma, it is a major crime to cross the border, or even to admit to the existence of the city on the other side. Each city has distinctive mannerisms and aesthetic traditions, and citizenship and “political location” are as much determined by conformity to the city’s norm as they are by physical location. I propose a costume for traveling between cities as easily as walking. Clothing for Orciny was exhibited at the Detroit Design Festival in September 2011 as part of the Border Town project.