Julie Merlino is a French interdisciplinary designer and materials researcher based in the Netherlands.
Research-oriented and process-driven, her work explores the convergence of traditional craftsmanship and cutting-edge technology, seeing their coexistence as a synergy.
With a background in textiles, she approaches material innovation through hands-on experimentation, questioning the use, possibilities, and semantics of materials and machines.
Her practice traces the interconnections between environmental and social change, looking at both climate and natural processes derived from non-human or more-than-human species, as well as human vernacular habits and rituals. To make these resonances visible, she has adopted a transversal and holistic approach, seeking alternative methodologies to materialize research and foster dialogue. As a textile expert, she emphasizes the importance of designing flexible, lightweight solutions and questions material use, energy consumption, recycling, and social responsibility. Committed to inclusive design practices, she integrates narratives that make complex ideas more accessible, using storytelling to reframe our relationship with the environment on a personal level. In doing so, she encourages reflection on how technology, infrastructure, and politics can be brought back to a more human scale.
Light plays a central role in her practice, appearing in diverse and multifaceted ways across her projects. As an active agent, light interacts with matter, being absorbed to transfer energy, triggering chemical reactions like photosynthesis (EcoDial), or influencing refraction and luminescence (A Change in Frequency). It also enables phenomena such as the photoelectric effect, where energy transfer alters material properties (Solar Matters).
Through her work, she cultivates awareness and dialogue around sustainability by merging storytelling with material research.
Her practice traces the interconnections between environmental and social change, looking at both climate and natural processes derived from non-human or more-than-human species, as well as human vernacular habits and rituals. To make these resonances visible, she has adopted a transversal and holistic approach, seeking alternative methodologies to materialize research and foster dialogue. As a textile expert, she emphasizes the importance of designing flexible, lightweight solutions and questions material use, energy consumption, recycling, and social responsibility. Committed to inclusive design practices, she integrates narratives that make complex ideas more accessible, using storytelling to reframe our relationship with the environment on a personal level. In doing so, she encourages reflection on how technology, infrastructure, and politics can be brought back to a more human scale.
Light plays a central role in her practice, appearing in diverse and multifaceted ways across her projects. As an active agent, light interacts with matter, being absorbed to transfer energy, triggering chemical reactions like photosynthesis (EcoDial), or influencing refraction and luminescence (A Change in Frequency). It also enables phenomena such as the photoelectric effect, where energy transfer alters material properties (Solar Matters).
Through her work, she cultivates awareness and dialogue around sustainability by merging storytelling with material research.
NEWS
Julie is working freelance and in her atelier in Rotterdam on EcoDial project (supported by Stichting Stokroos).
EXHIBITIONS
2025 (COMING SOON)
Z33 (Hasselt, BE) - A change in Frequency
2024
Texture Museum (Kortijk, BE)
Wonder Festival (Kortrijk, BE)
2022-23
The Energy Show - Het Institut (Rotterdam, NL)
2022
Van Pasvorm tot Polygon - Centraal Musuem (Utrecht, NL)
AWARDS & FuNDS
2024
Stichting Stokroos for Ecodial project