Condit’s design director, Kevin Trainor recently returned from Expo Milano 2015 in–you guessed it–Milan, Italy. Occurring once every five years, Expo is a modern-age world’s fair where participating countries come together and explore challenges facing our world. This year’s theme, “Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life”, posed the question of how to provide sufficient food supply for a population estimated to reach 9 billion by 2040, while maintaining the health of the earth.
The Expo is the platform on which technology, art, design and architecture fuse, stimulating dialogue and solutions to the theme’s challenge.
Expo Milano will run for six months (May 1 – October 31st, 2015) and expects to attract over 20 million people from around the globe. The event spans 490 acres, and is host to 140 countries. Each represented country stands present in the form of a pavilion. These impressive structures have been conceptualized and created by world-renowned architects. They act as microcosms of the country’s culture, abounding with traditional foods, spices, drinks, music, textiles, and more.
The pavilions are also educational pods in which technology is showcased and ideas are proposed. All relating back to the “Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life” theme, the pavilions are like mini-museums in which performances, exhibits, videos and interactive design bring participants on a journey of exploration, navigating the problems and solutions of the world’s agricultural health.
Through the lens of an exhibit designer, Kevin brought back valuable perspective and inspiration from Expo Milan. The architecture, intended to express each nation’s personality, was fascinating and varied. The exhibit technology, from projection mapping to interactive video, was outstanding. The stories told were compelling and often emotional–did you know, for instance, that one third of the food in the world is wasted, either from simply throwing it out or spoilage from improper storage and poor transportation?
Perhaps most valuable was the idea of creating structures and exhibits for a greater cause–as designers and fabricators at Condit, we have the ability to create spaces that enhance and contribute to a better world. We’ve always held green initiatives in our work practices to great value, but what really raises out eyebrows is the potential to create spaces that influence the larger public on global issues. We look forward to projects like this in our future.
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