_ garden of phygitality
tag: [work] [phygital] [digi]
date: 20221031
classification: autostereoscopic 3D LED display
location: Harajuku Tokyo Japan
team: Ellwood Chen & Austin Lightle
Autostereoscopic 3D LED displays use optical illusion to generate stereoscopic depth without auxiliary devices. Most autostereoscopic projects pursue a seamless effect in which the display dissolves into its surroundings—the screen is erased, and the image reads as physically present. This project proposes a different approach to phygitality, one that resists total immersion and instead operates through controlled openness and indeterminacy.
In Asian cultures, the courtyard garden occupies a distinctive position as a mediator between human intention and natural processes. Designing a garden requires anticipating both controllable and uncontrollable forces, balancing static composition with dynamic change, and accepting futures that cannot be fully predicted. This tension between what is designed and what ultimately appears informs our vision for the autostereoscopic display: a contained yet unpredictable environment.
We constructed a digital asset pool for the garden through VR-based modeling and 3D scanning, then ceded curatorial control to real-time digital simulation. Rather than sealing the top of the display volume, the phygital garden remains open, allowing the surrounding city to enter the work. Cars, buildings, streetlights, and passersby become part of the garden’s evolving collection.
The project avoids spectacle-driven, eye-dazzling imagery. Instead, it rewards attentive observation: the garden reveals itself differently depending on speed, distance, and angle of approach. What emerges is a three-dimensional urban synthetic landscape—an experience shaped as much by the city and its viewers as by the display itself.
