The School of Hope
Pavilion for Milan Design Week
Danish Design Award 2021
location : Museo Nazionale della Scienza e della Tecnologia Leonardo da Vinci, Milan, Italy
year complete : 2021
usage : temporary pavilion
area : 125 m2
architect : Lendager
structure : timber, chairs
contractor: Iver Entreprise
photos : Carmelo Trimarchi / Lendager / SE
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In summer 2021 Structured Environment had the pleasure of working with architects of Lendager Group on installing a temporary pavilion for the Milan Design Week. As Denmark’s contribution to the Milan Design Week the pavilion was the venue for an exhibition of Danish design, teaching, and welcoming the Danish Delegation lead by Mary Elizabeth, HM The Queen of Denmark (then HRH The Crown Princess of Denmark).
'The Tokyo chair' was originally designed for the Olympics in 2020. Here the Denmark Pavilion would offer a new perspective. It was to be built using 2,500 chairs as building blocks. As a travelling pavilion and structure, it was designed for disassembly. The chair is the building, and the building is the chair. Once separated, each building block functions as a two-in-one chair and can either continue its life as a dining chair, a lounge chair or be integrated in a new pavilion design.
The chair is made of wood and industrial waste plastic from Carlsberg. The structure is an interpretation of a waste free society. The modular structure makes the object flexible and 100% reusable.
In general, the pavilion can be categorized as a timber frame structure. SE was to design the structure built with chairs, checking the stability of the 'structural columns' made as a stack of six chairs each. These were connected vertically together using metal dowels. The vertical supports are connected to the timber beams of the roof and at the bottom to the timber beams of the floor. The roof and floor structures are built with a timber frame of primary and secondary beams. A simple bracing system of steel cables was added to provide extra stability.
