BREAKFAST, an innovative company based out of Brooklyn, New York, has a sole purpose; create inspirational and beautiful installations that are the culmination of art, engineering, architecture, and creativity. Their most recent attempt is truly awe-inspiring and is called Brixels.
You may think what you see is a tricky rendering of a product or some sort of screen with beautiful animations. Rest assured, this product, called the Brixel Mirror, is a truly physical creation that is, honestly, even more beautiful in real life than you can imagine or capture on video.
The Design
The design was rather simple; a series of monolithic tubes housing individual motors, encoders, sensors, and control boards that were capable of spinning a single brick around a central axis relative and independent to all other sub-structures. The sub-structures are called Brixels™, a clever combination of "bricks" and "pixels", and operate as their name suggests. The shapes themselves were physically dichotomous in either showing a matte-black or reflective-silver color. Depending on their orientation, either side of the Brixel™ interpreted light in a relatively unique way, which, as you can see, creates a truly beautiful larger structure. The reality of the overall Brixel Mirror is less-so a "dicotomous" flip-disc-like board, and more-so a greyscale and reflective 540 Brixel-big "screen", for lack of a better word.
The Idea
The idea, as described by Zolty, originally stemmed from watching the dusk light shining onto a fence being manipulated by a passing train. After several design deliberations, the team decided the now-called Brixels™ should be able to functionally operate as a fence-like barrier, out of honor to their inspiration, but be able to display information, patterns, notifications, and more. The Brixel Mirror does just that, as it's app-controlled interface is able to portray relevant information such as the time, temperature, music bars, and so on. The Brixel Mirror is a creative combination of mechanical and electrical engineering, all controlled by an elegant set of software and firmware. In a similar way that instruments combine to create beautiful orchestral pieces, Brixels™ combine to create a magnificent piece of Functional Art.
The Future
Their idea of "Bespoke Functional Art" is to create installations that appeal to the widest of audiences and appeal on a global scale. Brixels™ certainly does not fall short of that goal as they are a fantastic combination of bespoke engineering and art. Their installations are all one-of-a-kind and created to fit exactly into a space to best fit their client's desires. Their company features artists, designers, electrical engineers, mechanical engineers, and software engineers, which allows them to be dynamic in their creations and adaptations. For more information, visit breakfastny.com.