CIAL and the Recycling Consortia at the Milano Design Week with an art installation on circular economy.
The installation, designed by the architect Yona Friedman and called “Meuble Plus”, will be set up in the outdoor area of the Superstudio Più exhibition venue. It recreates an urban environment using only recycled and recyclable packaging.
The installation “Meuble Plus” was presented today in the Superstudio Più exhibition area in Milan, in via Tortona, 27. Created by Yona Friedman, an architect of French and Hungarian descent, it is part of the Smart City: Materials, Technology and People exhibition, organised by Material ConneXion® Italia, with the support of CIAL, Aluminium Packaging Recycling, CONAI (Italian Packaging Consortium) and other consortia for the recycling of packaging, i.e. Ricrea (steel), Comieco (paper and cardboard), Rilegno (wood), Corepla (plastic) and CoReVe (glass).
The aim of the installation is to reproduce an urban environment, a sustainability-oriented habitat, in which movable tower blocks and housing units (made from bottles, cans, pots, boxes, trays, jars and other containers we all use daily and recycle) are arranged in an area rich in vegetation, in order to create a temporary garden.
The installation is architecture with a social impact and raises the important subject of recycling and reusing materials, inviting viewers to valorise the end of the life cycle through transformation into secondary raw materials. It accurately expresses the concepts that can guide in the creation of a smart and sustainable environment in which to live.
The “Meuble Plus” installation is open to the public free of charge in the external area of Superstudio Più (via Tortona, 27 – Milan) until 12th May.
Yona Friedman, the theorist of the so-called “architecture of survival”, has focused mainly on the use of elementary structures and simple, fully recyclable materials, creating a completely sustainable and participative architecture based on the commitment of the community to constructing its own urban environment.
The topic of recycling packaging materials (and of circular economy in general) will also be the subject of a round table in which Conai and the Consortia will take part. The date for the round table, which will be held in the Superstudio Più premises, is Wednesday 18th April at 17.00. The round table, named “Circular economy: a multi-scalar approach”, will welcome many experts from the world of business, design and consultancy.
In the 20 years’ activity of CONAI and the Consortia in supporting the separation and recycling of packaging, 50 million tons of packaging waste have been recycled, preventing the emission into the atmosphere of 40 million tons of CO2 and the creation of 130 new medium-sized landfills.