Textile and somatic experimentation laboratory with Kombucha SCOBY

Multidisciplinary collaborative project between SCOBYS, Valentina Anzola, Sebastián Lema and PM.

This lab opens a dialogue and play with the kombucha fungus (the 'SCOBY,' the gelatinous layer that floats on the surface and enables its fermentation). It offered a possibility for future speculation about the relationship between microorganisms, the body, food hegemony, the performative act of dressing, and new forms of interspecies existence.

We open up the possibility of cultivating Kombucha as a plastic affection and somatic platform that allows us to be curious about clothing and speculatively reflect: How can we cultivate our own food while simultaneously cultivating the fibers that cover us? How can we generate kinship with the microbial community that surrounds us in its micropolitical dimension?

This laboratory, as a constant experiment, allowed us to raise large pools of kombucha and observe its development in different bodies of water (water from the páramo, water that springs from the subsoil of the Gaitán House-Museum in Bogotá, water from the aqueduct, and commercially available water). We experimented with different flavors in a secondary fermentation. We dried the SCOBY in direct sunlight and moistened the dried SCOBY with rainwater after designing a living dress.