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The Inflatable

A long white inflatable of sail fabric and clear plastic lying on a quay under a blue sky, a fan unit at one end — Blown up on the quay.

2025

Inflatable structure, radio and listening
On Air, Bergen School of Architecture. A collaboration between everyone on the course

A huge pillow of sail fabric and plastic, sewn by hand and blown up on site. It came out of On Air, where we treated air, sound and radio as architecture, and ran our own station, Radio Kontakt, on 1314 AM.

The outcome was a collaboration between everyone on the course, each working on a different part. Together with a trolley, the inflatable became a travelling listening room: for Radio Week we took it around for a week of events and live shows. My part was the bubble itself: testing shapes and materials, planning the build, and sewing and putting it together.

It has lived on since: blown up inside a gate for a lecture, taking the shape of whatever surrounds it, and handed on to the next course, whom I trained to use it.

People sitting on the floor inside the inflatable, the plastic roof glowing overhead, papers laid out between them — Inside: a listening room.

The translucent inflatable filling a workshop hall, a red DUST sign hanging above it — Radio Week.

The inflatable squeezed under the gate of a timber building by the harbour, in low sun — Inflated inside a gate for a lecture.

Close view of the plastic pressing against the gate, lettering on the wall seen through it — Taking the shape of its surroundings.

The inflatable lying along the windows of a hall with slatted ceiling and a yellow column — Radio Week, set up in a hall.

Pencil sketches of rounded, pillow-like plans and sections — First sketches.

A small plastic bag test blowing up against a graffiti-covered wall while a student lies on the ground beside it — Testing shapes.

A tall plastic test inflating on a workshop floor, a student crouched beside it — Testing materials.

Old sails with printed lettering spread across a large workshop floor — The sails, laid out.

Frida sewing sail fabric at a sewing machine on the workshop floor — Sewing.

A student sitting among folds of sail fabric, joining the seams — Joining the seams.

Two hands patching a tear in the clear plastic — Repairs.

Looking up inside the inflatable as two people hold up the fabric with their hands — Holding it up.