London-based fashion brand COS will return to this year’s edition of Milan Design Week, to present a large-scale collaboration with architecture and urban design practice ecoLogicStudio, marking the brand’s ninth consecutive installation during Salone del Mobile.
COS and ecoLogicStudio’s upcoming installation seeks to augment the interaction between the natural world and the built environment, presenting an interactive structure that bridges design and science. The immersive experience is brought to life through innovation which incorporates a diverse group of photosynthetic organisms; algae.
The work will explore the concept of circularity with new ways of incorporating biotechnology into the urban realm through the prism of design. While highly innovative, the installation draws inspiration from the rich history of the Palazzo which will host it and from Leonardo da Vinci’s 16th Century studies on water turbulence which lead to the conception of Milan’s canals’ system. The installation itself will remove carbon from the atmosphere, as a result of uses and benefits of micro-algae within the Palazzo’s walled garden.
“Sustainability and material innovation have always been at the core of COS.” said Karin Gustafsson, Creative Director of COS. “For Salone del Mobile this year our hope was to explore nature’s innovations and how these can be harnessed to offer new ways to live our day-to-day lives while reducing our impact on the environment and our planet. ecoLogicStudio’s important work displays not only how science and biology can inform and refine our processes, but also be viewed as part of the aesthetic. We are thrilled to be able collaborate on bringing their work to Milan on a grand scale.”
Claudia Pasquero and Marco Poletto of ecoLogicStudio note: “We’re delighted to be collaborating with COS to create an installation that represents an important and timely new step for us. We have been working for several years with the regenerative capability of many of our planet’s organisms to design circular processes converting what our cities expel into sustainable raw materials and nutrients.
With this project we have the unique opportunity to bring micro-algae’s photosynthetic force to the city centre of Milano, and the chance to address the relationship between art and science in the public realm, a fascination that we share with COS and that forms the basis our collaboration’’.
The installation will be open to the public from the 21st to 25th of April, 2020 at Palazzo Isimbardi, Corso Monforte 35, 20122 Milan.
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Source: Press release
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