Design - Graphic & Interaction Design
Radost Bozhkova
- Graduation work
Coded Culture
Radost Bozhkova’s research explores the concept of Bulgarian authenticity through symbols, heritage, and cultural memory, focusing on the role of traditional shevici (ornamental embroidery patterns) as carriers of meaning, identity, and belonging. Rooted in both material and nonmaterial culture, these patterns are not merely decorative elements but complex visual systems that encode beliefs, values, rituals, and histories passed down through generations.
Bulgarian cultural heritage exists in a fragile and often overlooked space - preserved not through formal institutions alone, but through lived experience, personal archives, handmade objects, and the memories of individuals. It is found in traditional clothing, embroidery, domestic environments, and everyday practices, where meaning is embedded in symbols rather than explicitly explained. These cultural expressions reflect a deep connection to place, ancestry, and collective identity, forming a sense of belonging that is both personal and shared.
The shevici themselves function as a symbolic language. Each pattern, shape, and composition carries significance, related to protection, spirituality, fertility, community, or the natural world. They operate as a form of communication across time, linking past generations to the present. At the same time, their meaning is not fixed. It shifts depending on context, interpretation, and the individual engaging with them. This makes them both historically grounded and open to reinterpretation.
The choice of this topic stems from Radost’s desire to reconnect with this raw and often unfiltered authenticity, and to question how cultural heritage can be preserved without losing its essence. In a contemporary world shaped by globalization and digitalization, traditional knowledge risks becoming static, aestheticized, or detached from its original meaning. This research seeks to explore how such heritage can remain alive, dynamic, and relevant.
One of the products is a website, which serves as the digital extension of this research, transforming it into a modern, interactive format. It acts as both an archive and a living system, where traditional patterns are not simply displayed but reimagined through generative processes. At the core of this system is a “shevica” generator, which operates through the three fundamental elements of the traditional “shevici”. These elements interact algorithmically to produce unique compositions, translating the logic of traditional shevici into a contemporary digital language, while keeping their meanings within.
Through this approach, each user becomes an active participant. The system generates a unique pattern specifically for the individual interacting with it, creating a personalized experience that reflects the variability and interpretive nature of cultural symbols. In this way, the project bridges past and present-preserving heritage while allowing it to evolve.
Ultimately, this work is not only about documenting Bulgarian cultural identity, but about reactivating it. By bringing “shevici” into a digital, generative environment, the research proposes a new way of understanding tradition: not as something fixed in time, but as a living system that continues to grow, adapt, and connect people across generations.
To bring the research back to its origin in lived, material culture, the project also extends into a physical analog form. Each user has the opportunity to translate their digitally generated “shevica” into a tangible artifact, embroidered onto a garment. These t-shirts reinterpret the traditional “nosiya” (the bulgarian traditinal clothing) through a contemporary lens - featuring clean, modern silhouettes that remain deeply connected to the symbolic logic of placement and meaning inherent in traditional clothing. In this way, the project completes its cycle, moving from heritage to digital transformation and back into the physical world, where cultural expression continues to be worn, experienced, and lived.
Visit the website here and make your own “shevica”: https://codedculture.netlify.app/home
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