My first brush with what would become Air Giants came in 2019, when Richard gave one of our Friday Lunchtime Talks — and brought along a full-sized tentacle that followed people around the room. I remember a cluster of people gathered around, asking questions about experience design and touring logistics, flexible actuators and innovation funding schemes. It was obvious then that this was something, but we still weren't sure what.

When the Air Giants team came together as one of the South West Creative Technology Network Automation Prototypes, it was in the depths of the COVID-19 lockdowns. While we were all working from home, rumours spread about "the snail" — an early version of what would become Luma.

Since then, the team have been a regular fixture at the Studio, really embodying the sense of generosity that characterises our community. I can't count the number of times I've seen them share their expertise with other community members, whether that's experience design, logistics, or a frankly staggering knowledge of unusual textiles.

The team also have a sense of joyful experimentation that encompasses every part of their work. When we funded Amy Rose for a MyWorld Fellowship in Residence with them, she was able to work towards a better sense of the narrative experiences their work makes possible, something sorely lacking in most innovation funding. The ideas that Amy documented are just a small fraction of the experiments and prototypes that they've made over the years — I have a personal fondness for Richard's leaf-blower powered inflatable coat.

In 2023, we were delighted to welcome their work for its first outdoor showing in Bristol as part of our Playable City Sandbox programme. Squeeze Me brought a new kind of interaction to their work, wrapping the trees of Brandon Hill in a set of pulsating creatures that responded to touch with light, sound, and movement. Earlier this year, as part of the Connected Futures Festival, we brought Luma to Millennium Square, helping to make the underlying technologies of 6G internet understandable to a wider audience (while also letting people drive a 9 meter robot snail).

Now we're delighted to be welcoming Air Giants back to Undershed, our immersive gallery space, with the Hothouse Laboratory, a summer show that invites you to invent and discover a strange story, and some giant colourful plants that move and glow in response to human touch.

Watching Air Giants evolve from that tentacle in our lunchtime talk to these sophisticated immersive experiences has been one of the privileges of working here. They've shown us what's possible when you give brilliant people time, space, and community to develop ideas that might seem impossible at first. That feels like exactly what we're here for.

 

The South West Creative Technology Network (SWCTN) was a £6.5 million project to expand the use of creative technologies across the South West of England, a part of Research England’s Connecting Capabilities Fund, which supported university collaboration and encouraged commercialisation for products made through partnership with industry.
 
Playable City and the MyWorld Fellowships in Residence were supported by MyWorld. MyWorld is a creative technology programme in the UK’s West of England region, funded by UK Research and Innovation’s (UKRI) strength in Places Fund (SIPF).
 
The Connected Futures Festival and 6G research project were led by the University of Bristol, alongside three core partners who represent each of the Future Telecoms Hubs —CHEDDAR, HASC, and TITAN. The festival was delivered in partnership with We the Curious, Watershed, Innovate Comms and ZiaBai.