One of the main principles of permaculture is that “the problem is the solution.” Problem: tons of waste cups created by attendees of the OutsideLands concert in San Francisco. Solution: a fabulous recycled cup canopy. BIOS Design Collective tapped a keg and invited their friends over for a canopy party, building a gorgeous wave of concave color at Stable Cafe just in time for Architecture and the City.

They started by stringing steel cable mesh above the Stable Cafe patio in equidistant lines. Designer Chris Chalmers created the layout for the cables using a definition created by Grasshopper, a graphical algorithm editor. Laminated cards depicting sections of the canopy helped volunteers to place their multi-colored cups in an artistic– and precisely algorithmic– fashion.

As the keg drained, revelers clipped the cups onto the cables with special, laser-cut plastic clips. We wonder what the next BIOS installation will be– plastic clip jewelry? Regardless, the resulting canopy was stunning in its form and precision. The BIOS blog boasts that the keg for the party cost more than the materials to create the canopy. We’ll drink to that.

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One Response to “re:Use Canopy Upcycled from Plastic Cups by BIOS Design Collective”

Beautiful Window Display Made from Recycled To-Go Cups | Inhabitat - Green Design Will Save the World says:

August 2, 2010 at 4:36 pm

[...] designers. One of many displays running along N Milwaukee Ave is an installation made entirely of up-cycled to-go cups sourced from local trash cans. Slow Commerce by The Indo Projects presents “cloud-like [...]