The Receptrotactile Kremble
The Receptrotactile Kremble is a tool and toy developed for an autistic center called the Nimbus. At the Nimbus they have a ‘Snoezelen’. Snoezelen is a Dutch concept for sensory stimulation and recreation rooms for handicapped and autistics. It is a house with different rooms for visually, tactile stimulation and certain rooms for relaxation. The rooms are filled with activity toys like ballpools, audio interactive flooring and a whirlpool. Their users are often autistic and handicapped children and adults, but also hyperactive schoolchildren and It-technicians. This was a 16-week project and it was the foundation of my BA-thesis. (Kremble= our English name for Kremlan, a Swedish mushroom called Russula in Latin)
Assignment: How do you make an interactive digital instrument for recreation and stimulation for the users in Snoezelen? My own assignment as the interactive designer in this project was: How do I make the Kremble so it suites most of the users at Snoezelen, and gives as many as possible sensory stimulation and joy?
Solution: The Kremble. The Kremble is an interactive mushroom that like a flashlight interacts with light. On the ceiling there is receptrodactyles, glimmering bowls with light receptors inside. When the flashlights halos hit the receptrodactyles, they lit up and music and sounds start to play. Different krembles gives different sounds. After a while you learn how to get immediate interaction and how to compose your own relaxing music. The Kremble can be used in bed, waterbeds, swings, hammocks, and ball pools. Blind, death, autistic and handicapped persons can use it. You can interact with your hands, arms, hips, body movement, mouth and head.
The sounds are available in different levels with different themes. Themes like animals (for children), ambient (for stressed-outs), drums, flutes, and orchestras. Certain themes are developed for autistics that only want repetition; those themes works well with very disabled persons that seldom ever get to affect their environment with any interaction. Our idea was that you could use the Kremble to “give” each other musical experiences and soundscapes. You could jam together and find a composition that you want to rest to or play and move to. My part was to develop the mushrooms as tools. I worked with different metaphors and internal relationships. They had to be safe, hygienic, cheap, unbreakable, charming, and most important immediate in their design and simple to get interactive results from.
Collaboraters: Martin Berglund: optics, light interaction designer, electronics. Magnus Torstensson: soundscapes, audio-narrative designer.