In the latest posts we talked about architecture and fashion and sustainability. There's currently a project by Mario Cucinella Architects that reunites these three concepts. The Italian architectural studio launched indeed bags made with materials upcycled from the Italian Pavilion at the 16th International Architecture Biennale in Venice.
Archipelago Italia, the theme of the Pavilion curated by Mario Cucinella, shifted the attention away from major cities and raised awareness about Italy, inviting visitors to consider remote areas, spatially and temporally distant from urban spaces, to learn more about their cultural heritage, while realising their richest potential and beauty. The diversification of the landscape, vast expanse and distance from essential services of these areas also prompted visitors to wonder what the future may held for these territories.
The installation featured seventy projects grouped into eight itineraries (Western Alps, Eastern Alps, Northern Apennines, Central Apennines, Samnite - Campanian - Lucanian Apennines, Daunia - Alta Murgia - Salento Sub-Apennines, Calabrian-Sicilian Apennines and Sardinia) presented as eight large books, a sort of tourist guide that introduced visitors to contemporary architecture projects, historical villages, paths, landscapes and natural parks.
The work of Mario Cucinella deals with very current issues - sustainability and the environment; social inclusion and sharing of intangible heritage; earthquakes and collective memory; work and health; regeneration and contemporary creativity - and Cucinella feels the work of the architect must reclaim a role of social responsibility.
Three years after the 16th International Architecture Biennale in Venice and with the ongoing Coronavirus pandemic, Cucinella realised that the role of architecture has also radically changed and this discipline is now called to help finding key solutions for what regards health (think about temporary hospitals and vaccine facilities), education (consider students unable to go back to school because of Covid-10 and following their classes online), work (will we ever go back to offices or will smartworking take over?) and society in general (ponder a bit about the various lockdowns and how they have transformed our lives, domestic spaces and needs). So the architect decided to start finding sustainable and useful solutions with a commercial line of functional products called "MC D for Recycling".
The first product is the Archipelago bag made (in Italy and available in two versions, a tote and a shoulder strap bag) with the fabric panels of the tourist guide-like books in the main hall of the Italian Pavilion in Venice.
In the first itinerary, Western Alps, visitors were invited to discover rural residences where local materials were used in a contemporary way, and in the fourth itinerary, Central Apennines, they learnt how new production spaces are harmoniously linked to the territory, through a skilful use of materials and surfaces. This emphasis on materials as explored by some of the project in that pavilion, inspired the design for the bags.
Apart from being made with upcycled materials and therefore looking different one from the other, the bags tell a story, representing a fragment of a pavilion, and invite us to start looking not just at the contents of the various installations when we visit an exhibition or an event, but also at the materials employed in the various displays and consider how we may reuse them in future to create garments and accessories or interior design products (think about how Prada pledged it will recycle the sets for its latest menswear show).
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