Project Brief: Build a website that responds to and graphically represents the current time. The timepiece should respond in a specific way to the current time when your site is loaded. It may also potentially respond to the passage of time while users remain on the site. It may recognize whatever units of time best serve your idea—seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years, decades, centuries, etc.
As the end of our five-week Interactive Design program drew near, I began to wonder about the life span of the projects we were creating and what would happen to our work in the future. It was a short program and we were producing projects at an accelerated rate. I was becoming increasingly aware of the passing time and the need for a continuous process of improvements and new discoveries through research and ongoing development.
Coincidentally the objective of this final project was to build a website that responds to and graphically represents time. I challenged myself to develop a timepiece that could, by some means, relate to the work we developed in the class, using a concept that could extend through time—past, present and future—and relate to all our work. I used plants and the action of watering these plants as metaphors for growth and maintenance. The current time is recorded when the page is loaded and the prompts take place based on the passing of time using second-based intervals. Ultimately the concept of time in this context relates to our work and how it flourishes during the span of its life as you continue to nurture it. It’s ironic in the sense that the plants I chose are cacti and cacti essentially don’t need much water to survive. For me, this was a symbolic decision representing all the projects that don’t seemingly require my attention or projects that I consider to be complete, reminding me that these projects may still need to be watered every now and then.
Designed at Yale University
Professor: Julia Novitch
Teaching Assistant: Tim Ripper