'Blue Island' is a bio-digital installation by Island Chen that recreates a bioluminescent algae habitat in a contained environment, serving as an educational tool and alternative solution in a context where a burgeoning eco-tourism industry is emerging around a harmful natural phenomenon.

Design Team

Island Chen, a degree project for MA Industrial design at Central Saint Martins

Matsu is a tiny taiwanese island located off the eastern coast of China. Isolated in the sea, the atoll has had little potential for economic development, and has, for the most part, fallen further and further behind its mother country. But that started to change when a strange bioluminescent algae began blooming on its shores. Scientifically referred to as dinoflagellates, the organisms cause the surface of the ocean to sparkle a deep, ethereal blue at night. The spectacle has attracted thousands of tourists, and has become an integral symbol within local culture.

There's only one problem. The frequency, duration and relative intensity of the natural phenomenon is directly attributed to nutrient pollution. Beautiful at nightfall, by day the algae curdles the water with a thick red pigment and feasts upon organisms in the water. The algae heighten ammonia levels in the sea, and with the help of thousands of pounds of floating trash and industrial waste, are capable of destroying marine life and threatening human welfare.

The 'Blue Island' is a bio-digital installation by Island Chen that recreates the dinoflagellates' habitat in a contained environment. The installation is adapted to function using agricultural wastes and combined with a roof bound fresnel lens to increase photosynthesis energy. 'Blue Island' is intended to act as an educational tool to help people remember that the algae is harmful, no matter how aesthetically pleasing. It also functions as a much-safer, viable option to retain the now burgeoning eco-tourism industry.

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