Head in the Clouds

Head in the clouds is a pavilion built on the occasion of figment’s 2013 ‘city of dreams art celebration’ in New York. The sculpture was assembled by Jason Klimoski and Wesley Chang from KCA architects, who needed 53,780 recycled plastic bottles and milk containers – this amount is consumed in NYC in about 1 hour. While the milk jugs form the exterior cloud visually, the interior is created from smaller 16 and 24 ounce PET bottles filled with blue colour water evocating the feeling of being in the middle of a cloud. This all is held up with an aluminium frame. The structure can shelter approximately 50 people. The installation ran for approximately 2 months from february 2013.

Pavilion Head in the Clouds, photo: Chuck Choi
Head in the Clouds section, picture: Lesley Chang
Head in the Clouds interior
Head in the Clouds exterior

(Pop)Culture

(POP)Culture shelter is a project by Garth Britzmann who intended to create a canopy shading device above a parking lot. 1581 empty soda bottles of 20oz (0.6 liters) were filled with a small amount of colored water. The basic structure of the canopy is a frame structure. The bottles are attached by strings. It took 27 volunteers 12,5 days to connect the bottles to the strings and erect the final construction. The object stood on site for three months. It was demolished because it was discovered that mold had formed in the bottles.
The projects’ geometry was created with the use of 3D modelling software Rhinoceros with scripting in Grasshopper plug-in for this program. First the surface was designed, and after that the length of the strings was derived, and also the color of the water for the bottles, which was related to the height from the plane.

POPculture shelter, photo: Chris Paulsen
POPculture shelter, photo: Chris Paulsen
POPculture shelter, photo: Chris Paulsen