Supercyclers! - Supercyclers in Milano

Written
by
Jenny Butler
Writer
Jenny Butler
22nd of April 2011

For the final installment of our week with Supercyclers, Sarah K reports to us from Milano and introduces us to some of the Supercyclers that are getting noticed on the other side of the globe. Thank you Sarah K and Liane Rossler for an insightful week, we have LOVED learning about Supercyclers and hopefully some more readers have been inspired to hop on their Supercycling bikes. Have a safe long-weekend all! - Jenny x

The Other Hemisphere exhibition of Australian design in Milan just last week!

Hello! Supercycler Partner/Milano Correspondent Sarah K coming to you live from Ventura Lambrate - the beautiful industrial modernist setting for the most interesting work at this years Salone.

Today is the day that I have devoted to a local hunt for the best Supercyclers in the dense design world of the Ventura Lambrate Zona.

Here's a looksee of our Supercycled things as they appear in The Other Hemisphere at Ventura Lambrate.

SO much interest from everyone into the supercycling phenomena was a most pleasant surprise....

Mark Vaarwerk's unexpanded works put a smile on people's faces and a really nice response to Plastic Fantastic plastic bag cups too...

This morning on our way to our exhibition, we called into visit the AutoOfficina Space, inhabited by ViJ5, Dutch designers living in Eindhoven, who have developed the amazing Newspaper Wood; layers of paper, pressed together with a glue to form a dense, beautiful, supercycled product. Christian Kocx' desk light is my favourite newspaper wood piece.

Lawrence Van Weiringen bowl, plate and cutlery

Next door is occupied by our new friend Lawrence Van Weiringen, who takes me aside to show us some supercycled work not on display.

Lawrence is sharing the space with De Vorm, a Dutch manufacturer who have put a very gorgeous chair designed by Benjamin Hubert into production. This chair is made from timber and PET - the recycled plastic bottle stuff...but it is Lawrence that offers us the supercycled gem; his idea is that that no form of plastic waste ever leaves their workshop, but instead they have made some molds to create his bowls, plates and utensils so all the plastic rubbish is turned into something useable again.

Piet Hein Eek - Supercycler-star

At Spazio Rossanna Orlandi I ran into veteran supercycler Piet Hein Eek, whose lovely smile lit up the room where he has installed his weighty recycled pipework and bridge timber chairs

Next stop is an exhibition of Berliners called Poetry Happens.

Those clever Germans have bought their own chinese-takeaway-making friends with them to feed the people - we've had their chilli noodles several times during the course of the event - delicious!!!

Our first visitors at The Other Hemisphere were the boys from ett la benn. Their beautiful pots and lights are not supercycled from waste but are made using completely biodegradable cellulose.

Creating no waste definitely counts as honorary supercycling!! And they are SO beautiful!

Werner Aislinger has developed another no waste product, the Hemp chair - completely composed of hemp and kenaf(?) bound with a bio glue.

Also in this same exhibition is Fabien Dumas' tools: lights supercycled from old rulers and tools. Functional + pretty.

Thanks for reading along this week- for more Supercyclers action, visit our blog here.

- Sarah K + Liane Rossler

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