Exploring the translation of form between digital and physical
realities through fashion and sculpture.
City Combat: Dodecahedron explores the translation of form between digital and physical realities. The project began as a series of NFT fashion collections inspired by the geometry of the dodecahedron, investigating digital garments as autonomous sculptural forms rather than wearable objects.
These virtual designs subsequently became the starting point for a process of material interpretation, evolving into experimental physical garments and sculptural objects. Positioned between fashion, sculpture and digital culture, the project examines clothing as a spatial structure capable of existing, transforming and acquiring new meanings across virtual and physical environments.
Rather than treating digital fashion as a simulation of physical clothing, City Combat proposes it as an independent field of artistic research where geometry, materiality and embodiment continuously negotiate new relationships.
PROJECT FRAMEWORK
Year
2021–2022
Status
Completed
Media
Digital Fashion · Sculpture · NFT · Physical Garments
RESEARCH FRAMEWORK
Research Questions:
How can digital forms be translated into physical materiality without losing their conceptual identity?
Can fashion exist as sculpture across both virtual and physical environments?
How does material translation reshape the meaning of form?
RELATED RESEARCH THEMES
Material Translation
Investigating how forms migrate between digital models and physical artefacts through iterative design processes.
Transformation
The project explores form as a continuously evolving structure rather than a finished object.
Digital Fashion
Digital garments function as autonomous sculptural entities rather than representations of clothing.
Speculative Design
Fashion becomes a medium for imagining new relationships between geometry, materiality and embodiment.
CONCEPT
At the center of City Combat lies the dodecahedron - a geometric structure that functions both as a formal generator and a conceptual framework. Rather than using geometry as ornament, the project investigates how complex spatial systems can generate garments that exist simultaneously as fashion, sculpture and digital artefacts.
The design process begins within digital space, where forms are developed independently of material constraints. These virtual structures are subsequently translated into physical garments through interpretation rather than replication. During this process, geometry interacts with gravity, material behaviour and the human body, producing new sculptural qualities that emerge only through physical fabrication.
The project therefore investigates translation itself as a creative methodology. Rather than reproducing digital forms, it examines how meaning evolves when objects migrate between computational and material realities.
DESIGN PROCESS
Geometric Research
↓
Digital Sketches
↓
NFT Collection
↓
Digital Garment Design
↓
Material Interpretation
↓
Physical Garment
↓
Sculptural Object
REFLECTION
City Combat: Dodecahedron introduced a methodological shift in my artistic practice by establishing translation as a central research strategy. Rather than treating digital and physical forms as separate domains, the project investigated how meaning emerges through movement between different states of materiality.
Working with digital fashion revealed that garments could function not simply as wearable objects but as spatial structures capable of continuous transformation. This understanding later informed projects such as Hybrid Opera, where costume became a bridge between physical and virtual embodiment, and ultimately Symbiotic Couture, where translation extends beyond materiality towards interactions between computational models and living systems.