45 ISH in Frankfurt : go 'Green' without being so green

We have disappeared for a few months due to our extreme condition of in-between moving to a new office which has been always on delay for many months. Actually we have many things to update on the blog, but just did not have time.

Today we come back with a long-been-postponed-to-be-featured project, an exhibition design (again) in Frankfurt.





Last week of last December, our super beloved client, Khun Wichai of SANA (you can perhaps remember some of exhibitions we did for him in the past), called us for an urgent task: to design and build an exhibition of his products along with the other 3 companies' products to be sent to Frankfurt by the 2nd week of January (basically 3 weeks from then and if we deduct the New Year's holidays, we had few days of works only) -_-'

The exhibition was ISH 2009 in Frankfurt, Germany, supposedly the biggest international sanitary ware trade fair. The space given is about 3 x 12 m. An interesting condition given by Department of Export Promotion who was the main organizer from Thailand, was to use recycle or recyclable materials - I guess it was from the strict Eco-Friendly German. We began to search possible materials to be the structure / main display of the exhibition --> it has to be light, easy to assemble with no extra labour involved apart from the exhibitors. Within few days, we found, Xanita, a company produces honeycomb recycle paper board. It is very light, quite durable if used indoor only. The super nice thing is Xanita teamed with another company that can print and cut them very accurately with CNC machine. So we had endless possibility. Not to mention, the staffs of the company who were very enthusiasm and helpful - thanks to them!

We did many small prototypes of folding cutting papers to have the sheets standing themselves without any extra structures and finally came up with this type. With the zigzag form, inward and outward, the sheet could stand without any problems. Here is the prototype, experimenting with some lighting.

The clients, apart from SANA, were WATSON, ANA and VN, (all of them were the manufactures of sanitary ware in Thailand) liked the prototype, but asked to make it a bit more colorful. Tatan, my ex-student, who is an expert on Thai traditional architecture and decorative elements, gave us some helps on the proportion of the patterns and colors. So here is the final prototype.


We then sent the drawings / artworks to be in production. Within fews days only, we got the panels.


Then at our previous office, we assembled all the 28 panels with 3 people (us), it took only 2 hours.. not bad indeed.


The real panels looked pretty much similar to the prototype. :) As you can see from the comparison here.


The whole exhibition filled up our space on the ground floor completely, rather nice..



The very simple form of folding in and out create quite nice effects with lighting.



The details are very simple. You can see the honeycomb section of the paper here.


Finally the boards were shipped to Frankfurt on time - thanks god! The exhibition was during the last March. None of us went along, but heard from Khun Wichai that it went well.

This was one of our experiments with 'green' materials without being outspokenly green as a color or exposed materials of brownish paper. :)

Go Green, without being so 'green'!

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37 Cyprus on PhiPhi ( an Island on an Island)

Last July we were back again to Phi Phi Island. This time was to work on the construction site with my students. (If you want to follow our progress on the project, HERE it is.)

On the last day of the trip, the free day for all, instead of swimming in the deep blue sea on the extra white sand beach, we, architects, were working on a competition!





Well, don't think that we are that serious or nerdy kind of people.. in fact it is rather the opposite. :-) There was a super strong reason why we were doing this competition in such a seaside paradise of Phi Phi island. The competition is organized by Cyprus Architecture Associtation, in occassion of Cyprus' participation to Venice Biennale of Architecture this year. (For those who are not familiar with Cyprus, it is an island in Mediteranean Sea, between Greece and Turkey --> more info HERE). A part of Cyprus' participation to Venice Biennale of Architecture this year is this competition, asking for a architectural idea for Cyprus as a touristic island of the mediteranean under the theme "In Cyprus–relax as Architects - Reinterpret"

Since we were in the extreme relaxation mood, and of course, we all are an architect, we had to do this particular competition, everything matched perfectly! Here we were working on the beach, a new experience of design... by the sea, with the winds and sands.. not bad at all. With our laptops & wi-fi, we discovered that working on the beach is not really a bad a idea. We set our portable office there for one day.


Not really a bad place to work at all... no? After working we also went swimming... What a life!


Our schematic design on the beach! Lovely, isn't it?


By the beach we were discussing and thinking about the competition, there was a wedding ceremony of a Westerner couple at Zevola Resort... which was very inspiring for us.


As you might have seen already from the result that we did not win the competition. However, we love our entries pretty much because we were super enjoying working on the beach and we love the very simple but cute ideas of ours. :-) So we would like to share them with you.

Our first proposal is called "How Deep is Your Love", of course it is from the super famous song of Bee Gees. Here is our plate:


Imagine Cyprus as an Island of Love.. When you arrive Cyprus from an airplane, the first image you see is hundreds of small heart-shape islands around the main island. It may sounds literal, well it does sound very literal, but in the world of relaxation, who cares about being intellectual, we think...It could be an image that Cyprus could sell themselves very well alll over the world, as the Island of Love.


The different size heart-shape islands are actually extensions of the beach surface of Cyprus on the rocky shores. The construction is very simple, they are merely a raft structure...a platform on the water next to the shore.


Different kinds of activities related to LOVE and relaxation could be housed there at the floating structures such as a wedding.... Imagine a wedding "at the bottom of my heart"...:-)


Private beach surface relaxation..


Or the small heart-shape island welcome also elderly.. who come for their XXth anniversary.. isn't it so romantic? :-)



The second idea we got was also very simple. It is called Cyprus Cafe' but we gave a nickname to it as "Sway with me, Stay with me".. (Again this one is from the song, "Sway", I know the version of Dean Martin, an old one, and a newer version from Michael Buble.) The lyrics are very super romantic:

When marimba rhythms start to play
Dance with me, make me sway
Like a lazy ocean hugs the shore
Hold me close, sway me more

Like a flower bending in the breeze
Bend with me, sway with ease
When we dance you have a way with me
Stay with me, sway with me

Other dancers may be on the floor
Dear, but my eyes will see only you
Only you have that magic technique
When we sway I go weak

I can hear the sounds of violins
Long before it begins
Make me thrill as only you know how
Sway me smooth, sway me now....
...........................

The main reason we use the word 'sway' is because we think of a little sway act as a supreme ideal of relaxation.. Again, imagine you are on the beach, in a hammock, a little sway here and there, with the sun, the sand , the winds, not to mention the sounds of the waves..a good book, and good foods... in life you would not need more.


Our idea is to have this a hammock cafe', a place where you can do a little relaxing sway, anywhere in Cyprus. (Actually, I got this idea of hammock cafe' in a rural area of Vietnam where people go to a coffee shop where they have many hammocks hung around for the customers..) But how to hang a hammock anywhere in Cyprus is not an easy task too. So we invented this simple device to help placing hammocks anywhere in Cyprus. It is a plastic tank with a form of six legs (I am sure there is a word for this shape in English.. but I don't know). With the form you can have a stable anchor in any ground condition. The plastic is so light that you can carry very easily, but when you want to it to become an anchor, just put some water in. ...... so simple, so light... (light techtonic is always our theme..)


Here we go: the set up of our hammock cafe' in different situation of Cyprus. On the beach...


In a beautiful open field..


Or even in an acheological site...well, we know that this one is a bit outragous.. but it would be nice to be in a very relaxing mood in an archeological site too..

Our first experiment of all(zone) portable office worked pretty well on Phi Phi Island (the theme of Cyprus went very well with the setting too). Although we did not win the competition, we are very happy to make them already. Hope you like them too. :-)

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07 ASA 06

This year, again, we were invited to participate the small competition to design the whole exhibition of ASA.
From our experiences, successes, failure of the past two exhibitions, we were very happy to improve. :) And as a result we won again the competition, three years in a role.

Our idea this time, is to use, again, very little material to gain the maximum effects. The sheet of a material called EVA (which we use for flipflop slippers) is cut in a pattern that can be expanded. The sheet will be both the display boards where the exhibition panels will be hung. The shadows casted by the lgihts throught those little holes would create a dramatic effect to the space without much material volume.







The planning is also an attempt not to obstruct any booth around by making 'opening' dragging people into the center, like a whirlpool. :)



We did some mock-ups ourselves and by Tanakul Design Group (thanks to Khun Sermsak again).





We decided to drop the project by the end of March (the exhibition was supposed to be at the first week of May). It was a pity, but then, we could foresee a worse disaster from some internal workind systerm with ASA if we would have kept the project on. Next time then. Life is still long, there will be plenty to opportunities to recycle our ideas. :)

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05 Love is in the Airs (ASA'04)

It was one of the most exciting works I have ever done in Bangkok.
We collaborated with Tanakul Design Group (super exhibition contractor in Thailand) to make a pitch for the work. And we got it :) The idea is how to fill a gigantic space of Impact Exhibition Hall 3,500 sq.m. of 21 m. high with the minimum materials. Inflatable structure was our answer. This way of doing inflatable structure was actually initiate by CICCIO group of Interaction Design Institute Ivrea (www.interaction-ivrea.it).





Another problem to solve is the exhibition display panel. We used simple plastic cups which could be refund after use to be translucent panels.



See the diagrams (Thanks to Pat - Chuti Srisanganwilas - who made the cute diagrams for us)



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