Working with the U.N., Ban has shipped paper log houses to Turkey and Rwanda. "Refugee shelter has to be beautiful," he says. "Psychologically, refugees are damaged. They have to stay in nice places." But it's not all about utility. Ban has managed to turn ugly-duckling cardboard into some gorgeous swans.
The Japanese pavilion he created for this year's EXPO 2000 in Hannover, Germany, is a huge undulating grid of paper tubes enclosed, like a covered wagon, with a paper canopy. A nine-ton, 87-ft.-long lattice arch of tubes currently swoops over the garden at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, casting a thatch of ever changing shadows.
Ban's designs touch the earth lightly in more ways than one. After EXPO 2000, his pavilion will be shipped to a recycling center to be returned to the pulp from whence it came. Just try that with bricks.
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Examine Shigeru Ban's original pencil sketches of his recent designs. |
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Name: Shigeru Ban Age: 42 Why critics are taking note: Ban's ingenious use of cardboard has redefined permanent and temporary shelter |
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