Milan 2016: designer Martino Gamper explains how he repurposed the Flyknit material Nike uses in its shoes to create drum skins in our next movie from the sports brand's The Nature of Motion exhibition in Milan.
Gamper's contribution to the Nike show, which presented installations by an array of international designers exploring the concept of movement, was a series of colourful drum sets.
"For this project, I wanted to explore the the idea of rhythm – the rhythm in running, the rhythm in drumming, the rhythm in music," Gamper says in the movie, which Dezeen produced for Nike.
"I created a series of drum kits and I used Flyknit technology as the drum skins."
Nike's Flyknit material is a flexible, breathable textile made from synthetic yarns. It is usually used by the brand to make uppers for sports shoes that are knitted in one piece like a sock.
Gamper made three sets of drums using the material – a classic rock drum kit, a cocktail drum kit and a set of marching band drums – with each drum featuring a different pattern.
The challenge was creating a textile strong enough to be stretched taught over the drums, Gamper says.
"I worked very closely with the Nike in-house team to produce these flyknit drum skins," he explains.
"Usually Flyknit is used to create quite a small knit for the shoes. They haven't ever knitted anything that large."
He continues: "We had to create a very dense material that you can stretch in all directions. I think it was interesting for them to push their technology."
Gamper is not a drummer himself, but he says he was drawn to the idea of creating a series of drum kits after watching footage of marching band processions.
Subscribe to Dezeen's YouTube channel for the latest architecture and design movies
"You instantly get this sense of people being affected by it," he says. "That's what I was after, to create drumming that could then reverberate and go out in the world, to create a wave of sound."
This movie was filmed by Dezeen in Milan for Nike. It is the fourth in a series of movies looking at the work presented in The Nature of Motion exhibition.
In the first movie in the series, Nike's vice president of global design John Hoke introduces the show and explains why putting on an exhibition during Milan Design Week is important for the sportswear giant.