The agency

Description

Big Bang Project (BBP) is the agency of designer Guillian GRAVES. It mobilises design, science and technology in the service of living things: both society and the environment.

Based in Paris, it takes its name from the theoretical model of the same name describing the stages in the evolution of the Universe, from the moment when Space, Time and Matter emerged to the present day. These events led to the creation of atoms and galaxies after a long series of phase transitions. The Big Bang is the inspiration for our project, both in terms of its process and the means used to understand it. It brings together scientists, engineers and designers, taking advantage of the co-evolution of technologies and knowledge to build new hypotheses, new concepts and new visions of our world past, present and future.

Methodology

Through design - a design practice that puts use, users and the environment at the heart of its thinking - the agency's aim is to draw on the sciences (primarily biology, but also chemistry, physics, mathematics and computer science) and technologies to provide a creative response to the major challenges of today and tomorrow.

Our teams are resolutely and systematically multidisciplinary, and our networks of scientists, designers and engineers work hand in hand to respond to problems in a concrete way that is rooted in reality, while maintaining scientific rigour. This approach allows us to continually explore issues such as the future of housing, energy, health, food, mobility, sport and space.

Depending on the issue in question, the solutions we design can take different forms. They can take the form of new materials, products (goods and services), experiences, places, forms of organisation, etc.

Missions

The agency is structured around three missions: Research, Innovation and Education:

• Research, to produce knowledge and develop methods, tools and know-how to put science and technology at the service of life;

• Innovation, to imagine, develop and bring to market new solutions in response to the major challenges of today and tomorrow;

• Education, to share and pass on our vision and expertise to organisations and research centres through a wide range of media, teaching, conferences, publications, workshops and exhibitions.

Objectives & values

The aim of all the agency's projects is to help build more sustainable, responsible and desirable societies for the future. Contrary to popular belief, the major environmental, climate, health, social and societal challenges are formidable driving forces for innovation. It's worth noting that Big Bang Project has solid expertise in biomimicry, an approach that involves drawing inspiration from living things to innovate in a sustainable way.

Visibility

The innovative nature of the agency's work, both in terms of its approach, which breaks with the traditional practices of design, engineering and science, and in terms of its results, has led it to be presented at over two hundred and fifty conferences in Europe, the United States and the Middle East to date. They have also been exhibited in seventeen different cities and six different countries, from the MAK Museum Vienna in Austria to New York Design Week and the Centre Pompidou in Paris, and are regularly presented and cited as references in the international press and specialist publications. These projects have been featured in Wired Magazine, Stuff Magazine, Usbek & Rica, Frame, Le Monde and in publications such as Les Ruptures Fertiles - Design et innovation disruptive, 75 designers pour un monde durable and Designer(s) du design. His work is also regularly featured in television and radio documentaries, including the documentaries Rêver le Futur and Objectif 2050 broadcast on Planète+, and the documentary series Nature=Futur! season 1 and season 2. In 2024, Vogue magazine selected Guillian for its list of 100 Innovators of the Year.