Between digital and physical. Envisioning and prototyping smart material systems and artifacts from data-informed scenarios.

Acknowledging the roles and potentials of data as activators of design processes within the domains of speculative design and prototyping, the authors are running a study fostering collaboration between the fields of smart materials, digital fabrication, interactive artifacts, and speculative design. This paper discusses the possibilities offered when data meets digital fabrication technologies for the construction of smart material systems. Integrating smart components and flexible electronics, novel materials with responsive behaviours can detect, process, and manifest data. Such nature and features make a speculative design approach key for contextualizing these materials in a social, environmental and ethical future dimension to define their purposeful applications. Situated in this cross- disciplinary design area, this paper describes the grounding theoretical framework for the setup of a 2-day hackathon where interactive materials possibilities and implications were addressed and unpacked. Finally, the paper discusses potentials, limitations, and future possible scalability of the experiments and models presented.