DARK FRUIT Part 2 Project 2007 Rosy Head Royal College of Art | UK Dark Fruit – ‘every new invention casts a long shadow’ (Virilio)Dark Fruit investigates the contradictions between our desire for untouched, Thoreau-esque nature and our pursuit of technological advancement. Depression and anxiety are the largest causes of ‘measured misery’ in the UK and with rapidly expanding markets for alternative treatments and organic produce, can we reconcile the authenticity of nature with the alchemic ability of nutraceutical nanotechnology?We are offered a future of fruit enhanced with drug-delivery systems, where we can shop, consume and believe once again in the British blackberry, oblivious to the complex technological infrastructure required to keep it in full bloom. In a world of daily increasing carbon guilt, Rosy supposes a near future where atomically modified English superfruits become a welcome alternative to imports from far-flung rainforests. In a seductively rendered proposal for a food market on the Thames, she explores a world where the design outcome is very different from ones indicated by existing surprise-free masterplans. Driven by social fiction and real people, not science fiction and broad-stroke demographics, Rosy's project makes a possible atomically modified future familiar and in so doing becomes a powerful innovation tool that enables ourself and others to question our design values.