2009
JUST UNDO IT.
How to Transform a Hoodie Into (Nearly) Anything.
Year: 2009
Project Type: Instruction Manual
Publications:
Scarponi, A. “Just Un Do It”, in Hickey, A. (ed.), A Guidebook of Alternative Nows, Journal of Aesthetic and Protest Press, Zurich, pp. 107–112, 2012
Scarponi, A. “Just Undo It”, in Wired, Italian Edition, No. 3, p. 118, 2010
Commissioned by: GQ Magazine
Author: Antonio Scarponi
Video: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL10F8BD2C3F8CA05F
Collaborators: Maya Westman, Susan Park. Photo
Photo: Monica Tarocco, 2013.
This project renders legible the epistemic actions articulated as DEMA in Epistemic Design.
Just Undo It (2009) is a collection of everyday objects generated by folding a hoodie. The project reflects on design as a form of information and narrative capable of transforming what is already available, proposing that design today should offer a product less rather than a product more.
Originally commissioned by GQ Magazine Italia on behalf of Nike, the project was conceived as a communication strategy for a high-end sweater produced in Japan. The proposal deliberately avoided designing a new object, instead introducing a collection of objects that do not exist unless they are made through use, folding, and imagination.
The communication strategy was rejected, and the project was subsequently released independently. Within a short time, Just Undo It became viral online and has since been referenced as a classic and iconic anti-product. Its circulation through digital networks marked an early moment in which design operated primarily as transmissible instruction rather than manufactured form.
By shifting attention from production to transformation, Just Undo It redefines design as an informational and cognitive operation. The project anticipates a condition later articulated within Epistemic Design: design does not add objects to the world but reorganizes the relations that make objects intelligible.
Displace — The project displaces the design problem from producing an object to redefining what an object is, shifting value from fabrication to use, instruction, and reinterpretation.
Expose — It exposes the narrative and informational dimension of design, making visible how meaning, form, and function can emerge without material production.
Mediate — Just Undo It mediates knowledge through instruction and demonstration, transferring design agency to the user and translating design into a readable, repeatable operation.
Activate — The project activates the user as a maker, performer, and interpreter, requiring participation for the work to exist at all.