Designers team up to trash cars!
Transfodesign is a team that invites designers and architects to create objects from waste in a series of events called “Thrash Investigation Series”. This year’s challenge was recycled cars, or “Trashcars”, as they call them. The event took place at the Fabra i Coats creative centre in Barcelona and was part of the BCN Design Festival.
Over two consecutive days (1 and 2 October 2012), participants had the chance to build a construction or installation using car parts. They had to design their projects and plan their materials before the event, while Transfodesign undertook to provide all the materials and tools needed to realise them. The event was open to the public, and visitors could follow the making of the works from start to finish. The teams’ completed works were presented to the public at the closing ceremony on 4 October 2012. Visitors were able to see the different ways in which car waste can be handled, transformed into completely new objects, and to hear the designers themselves talk about the concept behind each piece.
Trashcars had the honour of welcoming the French architects Pimpilimpausa, who turned an abandoned car into a funky green space; the local studio Bel&Bel, with their cool fridge built entirely from the parts of a Seat 1500; and the Barcelona designers Cristian Montesinos and Guillem Ferran, who joined forces to discover the sixth R, Relove, of creative recycling and to explore the potential for domestic use of non-domestic elements: car parts. Finally, Starter from Sabadell turned an entire car into a robot/DJ booth and surprised everyone with a DJ set and visual performance at the closing ceremony.
Trashcars received a wonderful response and a great deal of interest, with immediate coverage from the online magazines MAKA BCN, Diario Design and Sin Freno, thousands of shares and likes on social media (Facebook, Instagram and Twitter), and more than 150 visitors throughout the event.
For more information, visit: www.trashinvestigation.com
Photographs: Faku Uzal Photography (www.fakuza.com)
