Welcome to Uttzeera!

For my current studio project we were given an area from the shipping forecast. We pretty much had free reign to do what ever we wanted to design something for that given area. I was given 'North Utsire', an area off the coast of Norway. The area is named after the island of Utsira which is very well known for bird-watching as well as having most of their electricity powered by wind turbines. I was very intregued by the idea of a self-sufficient community. I also looked into the vikings which are also associate with the area. Combining these three aspects which i found most interesting I decided to create a communtity that is abandoning technology and resorting back to a life based on true skill (taken from the vikings) and community spirit. My target audience would be older, single people, mainly people who have been in very busy work positions all their life and have possibly sacrificed familes etc for it. The new community would appeal to people who feel lonely in this chaotic world and want to become part of a close knit community. The community works in a hierarchy of birds - each person is allocated a bird position based on their level of skill. I decided what type of bird went with what skill using bird symbolism, for example, eagles are at the top of the hierarchy as they are symbolic of power and said to be 'king of the birds' the job related to this would be the main organisers, the people who oversee everything and sort out any problems. The people who build and maintain the shelter would be geese, and geese are symbolic of safety and protection, which is what the shelter would be to the people...and so on. The 7 birds in the hierarchy are eagle, goose, crane, vulture, peacock, falcon and duck.




These would be small communities within (although no one is 'bottom of the pecking order' so to speak). They would wear a tribal style necklace so that they could identify each other. I handmade the necklaces using material, clay and wool. Me and a few of the girls went to St andrews beach to take picture of them being modelled as you can a few of them above. It was a very cold and wet day but I'm pleased with how they turned out :) I am currently making a welcome pack for the necklaces to go in to be delivered to the people before they set our to join the community life, I will keep you posted on how it turns out!