Ink and Switch interactive homepage

Ink & Switch, a research lab, marked its tenth anniversary with Tenfold, a set of ten interactive letters built inside its research environment, Patchwork. Each letter is a small tool whose settings, such as density, rotation, position and the number of splines (the curves that form a letter), can be adjusted.

The project's origin story says the idea began when the author sketched a catenoid by hand for the letter I and wondered why a computer was not generating the form. A shared playground, described as a tool for making tools, then let lab members, and later friends of the lab, contribute their own letters, including animations and a playable bullet-hell game. Building an adjustable tool instead of a fixed design left room for other people to add their own work.