After a consultation with Mr Andrew today, we had realised that our garden concept is far too disconnected from peranakan culture. there is no conenction between bee and peranakan, which will cause confusion in the visitors as they will not know that the exhibit is linked to peranakan wedding. we were told to explore more on comparing to show more on our theme, hardship and glamour. after getting feedbacks from others, we had decided to combine our 2 initial ideas.

we wanted to try to engage the users with our interaction in other ways. we had also decided to work on the way of 'raw material, sewing/choosing of the motif and also the wearing of the wedding gown.

our idea starts with the user touching the showcase of cloth quailties used for making of the wedding gown. when the user touches the cloth, visual feedback of different motif moving around on the cloth will be shown. e.g. motifs of butterfly will be flying around on the cloth that the user had touched. this feedback is included to engage the users more, and also to make them be more curious about the rest of the exbits.

following on will be 2 different paths for the user to choose. they can either choose to sew the motif, or be able to view the meaning of the most commonly used motif on wedding gown, the phoenix and peony.

on choosing the sewing path, the users will be lead to a room with a sewing machine big enough for 3-4 users to operate. users who are alone, will be able to step on the paddle and operate the machine, but with the help of other users, this tiring process can be ended faster. the speed of the motif being completed will depend on how fast the paddle is going. upon completing the whole motif, the motif will then be 'alive' and show the user what does it means.

if the user decides to go by the other path, they will be brought to a virtual land with a peranakan feel. in this land, they will be treated to a show of visual effects of the phoenix flying gracefully around, which will show the meaning of phoenix. the same goes for the peony motif. at a certain time, the 2 motifs will cross each other path, wiping out the original individual meaning of each motif, and replacing them with the combined meaning of both motif.

both of the paths will lead to the dressing room, where the user will see themselves being projected on a screen, where they will be required to wear the wedding gown which is deteched through gestures of the user. as there's many different layers that the bride is required to wear, the users will have to trail and error on which goes first. however, they are only allowed 3 tries and when all 3 tries are used up, the correct way of wearing the wedding gown.

Shuyun