Sunday's tale: Bottle Masonry. Made house with recycled plastic bottles

Sunday's Tale: a post from the past

On Sustainable diary last Sunday we spoke about an amazing building made with glass bottles, and also today we decide to tell a bottle’s story.

Plastic bottle construction is an idea of Andreas Froese, an architect and environmental entrepreneur. Froese developed Eco-Tec, a method to utilize plastic (PET) bottles as “bricks” in the construction of houses, latrines, and water tanks. It is a good idea to address the problem by putting to use some of the million plastic water bottles discards each day in developing nations.

The first plastic bottle construction project in Africa was pioneered in Uganda by an organization called Butakoola Village Association forDevelopment - BUVAD. BUVAD is located in Kayunga, a district north of Kampala.

They teamed up with Eco-Tec to bring bottle construction technology to Uganda in the form of a latrine block. Students and community members at a local primary school collected and filled bottles found throughout the community and together they built a block of latrines for their school. Constructed in April 2010, BUVAD’s latrine block was the first of its kind on the continent.

Benefits of Bottle Construction

Waste management - A small house can use as many as 10,000 bottles, waste that would otherwise be deposited in a landfill or burned.

Environmental protection - Unlike “traditional” bricks, bottle bricks are not fired, a process which uses much firewood and contributes to deforestation.

Cost effective - Building with bottles is typically less expensive than building with bricks as the main construction material is trash.

Job creation – The construction process of building with bottles is work intensive. This means many can be involved in the process, creating opportunities for employment and community involvement, from collecting to filling to building. While this method would potentially be costly in more industrialized nations, where labor is expensive and materials are cheap, in countries like Uganda, materials are expensive, labor is cheap, and jobs are in demand.

Shock resistant – The plastic coating of “bottle bricks” makes them more flexible than fired bricks. Bottle construction has greater shock resistance and is well suited for earthquake prone areas.

Long lasting – It is estimated that it takes a plastic bottle approximately 300 years to decompose.

Here you can have a tutorial, and here you can find some inspirations.

More info

website Eco-Tec

facebook page

Photo credit © Aminu Abubakar

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Buffalo Project: on-demand mobile electricity. A simple and unique solution

In recent years mobile phone communication has been a major contributor to economic growth in developing countries but its spread has been hindered by limited charging options for the 650 million off-grid mobile phone users who have network access.

Having an operational phone means access to services that have improved banking, health and farming in Africa and Asia. Many millions of people at the bottom of the economic pyramid are expected to acquire mobile phones, greatly benefiting their lives, business activities and access to information. However, most of these new subscribers will not have direct access to electricity.

In response to the growing problem, London-based Buffalo Grid have developed a text message activated solar-powered cellphone charging station to help cut electricity costs. The technology utilizes a 60-watt photo-voltaic panel, which charges a battery that is then taken to the village on the back of a bicycle. The portable micro generator extracts power from the harvested solar energy using a technique called maximum power point tracking (MPPT) - providing on-demand mobile electricity. The system is activated when a customer sends a text message to the device. Once the message is received, an LED above a socket on the battery lights up, indicating that it is ready to charge a phone. On average, each text message allows a phone to be charged for 1.5 hours; where a fully charged 'buffalo grid' unit can last for three days, with up to 10 charging points and charge 30 to 50 phones per day.

In addition to this, Buffalo provides environmental benefits through supplying zero CO2 power which translates into increased access to safe lighting. The system can also be used to provide off-grid power for a range of uses from medical to educational applications.

It will help in bringing a considerable amount of economic growth to hundreds of rural communities around the world.

More info

website Buffalo Grid

facebook page

Photo credit © Buffalo Grid

Buffalo entrepreneur, Bududa village, Uganda

 

 

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My space is small. My life is big

TreeHugger founder Graham Hill describes his lifestyle in the New York Times,

Here youcan read the complete interview. I did not consider the case to summarize it, it is very good and well worth to read it all!

"I sleep better knowing I’m not using more resources than I need. I have less — and enjoy more."

He draws the principles of degrowth theory. The decrease is a current of political thought, economic and social environment to the controlled reduction, selective and voluntary economic production and consumption, with the aim of establishing relations of ecological balance between man and nature, as well as fairness among human beings themselves.

Degrowth is something that we need to think:

"Our fondness for stuff affects almost every aspect of our lives. Housing size, for example, has ballooned in the last 60 years. The average size of a new American home in 1950 was 983 square feet; by 2011, the average new home was 2,480 square feet. And those figures don’t provide a full picture. In 1950, an average of 3.37 people lived in each American home; in 2011, that number had shrunk to 2.6 people. This means that we take up more than three times the amount of space per capita than we did 60 years ago.

Apparently our supersize homes don’t provide space enough for all our possessions, as is evidenced by our country’s $22 billion personal storage industry."

In this video you can see where and how Graham Hill lives:

More info

website  Graham Hill

facebook page

Photo credit © New York Times

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Make food not war! Vegetable Weapon by Tsuyoshi Ozawa

Sustainable diary loves speaks about food and food culture, so when we watched the pictures of Tsuyoshi Ozawa on Inhabitat we thought: "This is a good story for start the week".

The artist was born in 1965, Tokyo. In 2001, he began “VegetableWeapon”, a series of photographic portraits of young women holding weapons made from vegetable.

He realized this photo project in different countries around Asia, America, Europe, and Africa. He finds a woman that live in the place and asks her to gather vegetables and other ingredients needed to make an indigenous hot-pot dish. After the food is creatively arranged in the shape of a firearms, he starts shooting the absurd war-like portraits.

Once the photograph is made, Ozawa and his model disassemble the delicious weapon, cook the ingredients, and share a meal together. Vegetable Weapons shows how humor and art enable us to talk about delicate subjects like war, food culture and power.

"Drawing on the dynamics of everyday life and human interactions, Ozawa combines real-life incidents, situations and materials to create works which draw attention to ideas and issues central to social and political life.

[...] He intends these processes to create an opportunity for discussion of issues such as conflict, war and injustice using the construction of an art work as the catalyst for dialogue."

More info

website Tsuyoshi Ozawa

facebookpage

Photo credit © Tsuyoshi Ozawa

 

 

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Starving Artists Project tells the stories of homeless artists

Despite their massive presence, the homeless are widely ignored. They are part of city invisible culture. But every day this people communicate to us, telling their basic need for help through a piece of cardboard. Each sign expresses a basic human need in a creative way completely unique to the creator’s life.

StarvingArtists Project is a new initiative, it try to change all of that by giving NYC’s homeless community a platform to showcase their cries for help. The program seeks to turn the cardboard signs we see being held up on street corners and in subway stations into art that funds social change.

The creators of the project, Nick Zafonte and Thompson Harrell, worked with world-renowned photographer Andrew Zuckerman (famous for shooting portraits of politicians, humanitarians, artists and entertainers) to capture beautiful, dignified portraits of each “artist” as well their handmade artistic signs and turn the images into a collection of art to inspire change.

The Starving Artists Project Film from Thompson Harrell on Vimeo.

The collection of diverse cardboard signs, along with portraits , debuted at the Dumbo Arts Center in January, 2012. The project showcases 35 handwritten signs, accompanied by portraits of the 30 artists who wrote them. A giant 4 ft tall collection cup was constructed and placed in the center of the gallery - all donations were given to the New York City Coalition Against Hunger and Holy Apostles SoupKitchen, two local charities focused on feeding the local community.

Zafonte and Harrell explained to the Huffington Post: “Everyday the homeless reach out through the only means they have, scraps of cardboard and their own creativity. The problem is we don’t ever look, seeing their messages as an interruption to our day. Our mission and solution was to change the way society interprets their messages – by presenting their signs as art, allowing their own voices to inspire meaningful action.”

More info

website Starving Artists Project

Photo credit © Starving Artists Project

 

 

 

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Afghan Dreamers, a project book to break stereotype on a country

Afghanistan is probably best known in the world for its poverty, destruction, terrorism and oppression. But Afghanistan is not just a ongoing conflict. We are all half blind by the influence of the world of mass media, seeing only one part of a story. Against this backdrop, are the dreamers and visionaries. Artists, musicians, innovators, activists, media moguls, and politicians. Just like any other country – the dreamers and the free thinkers are often those whose stories are quieter than the stories of violence and anger that shout more loudly. That doesn’t make them less powerful.

Afghan Dreamers is a book project that seeks to tell these stories; the ones that draw a different picture of Afghanistan. A picture that shows the innovation and inspiration that can be born out of destruction.

The book will bring together interviews with 20 plus Afghan innovators and dreamers, these include: the artist Shamsia Hassani, the musician and filmmaker Ariana Delwari, the mayor of Kabul Muhammad Yunus Nawandish, the bass player for District Unknown, Afghanistan's first metal band, Abdul Qasem Foushanji and much more...

the artist Shamsia Hassani

Afghan Dreamers is a partnership between Sharp Stuff, an independent publishing project, working on new ways of storytelling and engagement, and Mountain2Mountain, a burgeoning nonprofit organization. This is a project that amplifies the voice of these dreamers. Forty years of war may have destroyed much in this region, but these stories, these dreamers, show that it hasn’t destroyed the pride and spirit of Afghanistan.

What is very important is that they need your help to make this book project a reality. You can help amplify these voices and show the world that stereotypes need to be challenged and our eyes and ears need to be opened. You can support this project and be part of the story. It takes the global community to hear these stories, believe in the dreamers, because it is the dreamers that will change the world!

More info

website Afghan Dreamers

Facebookpage

Photo credit © Afghan Dreamers

the musician and filmmaker Ariana Delwari

the bass player for District Unknown

the mayor of Kabul Muhammad Yunus Nawandish

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The only hotel in the world without rooms: Faktum Hotel

Today we want to tell the story Faktum Hotel, the only hotel in the world without rooms. It is located in Gothenburg, the second largest city in Sweden. With just $ 10 you can book a night in one of 10 different places at your disposal: a forest, an abandoned building, a park bench. These are all en-plein-air, so you can try to sleep as a homeless man.

A description of the hotel's "rooms" tells you everything you need to know: "A stay at the Skeppsbron wharf assures you a waterside vista in the heart of the city."

One of every six homeless people in Sweden live in Gothenburg, they are 3.400 circa. Most of them find a roof over their heads with a friend or at a refuge, but some sleep in the open air.

The brainchild of Faktum magazine editor-in-chief Aaron Israelson, the hotel plans to give its profits to support the magazine's charity work, aimed at raising awareness of Sweden's homeless population. Aaron told: “We don’t think politicians do enough. This is a reminder of poverty and a way to get involved in an easy manner."

There are a tonne of ways to think about Charity Campaigns, but this one is just a tad different.

There have been about 1,000 bookings so far. You can book one for yourself, or as a gift for somebody else. Either way the money goes to the work for homeless and socially vulnerable people.

More info

website Faktum Hotel

Facebook page

Photo credit © Håkan Ludwigson - Faktum Hotel

 

 

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Junk food kill more people than pistols

These are days when you continue to talk in the media of food scandals, horse meat masquerading as beef, donkey's meat in hamburgers, fake biological chicken eggs, etc. .. so when we found ourselves in front of the video Food Fight, by Earth Amplified we launched a large whistle!

The video is a urban gangster movie turned on its head.— instead of street thugs coming in to steal money and groceries, this films shows guys in suits put things on the shelf. It is the story of a young boy who lives in a world where the food at the local corner store is killing his neighborhood, literally. The real damage to the kids and America is from these men at the top; the crimes of Big Ag at a convenience stores is so much worse than what anyone could ever do during a stickup. Obesity and poverty co-existing side-by-side and a food industry that fights hard to keep us in the dark about the correlation between cancer and our diet.

It is a powerful and hard hitting reminder to us all that gun violence is just one symptom of a deeply dysfunctional economic system. And it's an argument that's making its rounds of the internet in a hard-hitting hip hop video that compares the food industry to gangsters and drug dealers.

 

Sugar is as addictive as cocaine. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

Last but not least: support the movement for thriving communities by getting this into schools and donating to SoS Juice. SOS Juice, is a solar-powered for-profit/non-profit hybrid that will sell juice, smoothies, and compost in order to improve health, promote sustainable agriculture, and create green jobs for low-income youth and the formerly incarcerated individuals.

More info

website Earth Amplified

Facebook page

 

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Bring butterflies back into the city, with Ettore Favini

Today, until Friday 5 April 2013, the Pastificio Cerere Foundation in Rome will present the exhibition project by Ettore Favini Verdecuratoda…voi (which forms part of the vaster project Verdecuratoda begun in 2005) curated by Marcello Smarrelli.

Favini’s research explores man’s relationship to nature and time, reading the social context in all of its complexity. For this new project, the artist rereads the subject of ecology from a contemporary perspective, involving spectators in a “game” that binds them to an act of responsibility toward themselves and the environment.

Verdecuratoda…voi, presents an opportunity to trigger a real environmental metamorphosis. In addition to prompting the urban forestation of green species, this phase of the project aims to bring butterflies back into the city, thus restoring an important marker of air quality to urban areas.

The show is structured around several intercommunicating devices.

The space will contain a vending-sculpture from which attendees will be able to withdraw, using a €1 coin, spheres containing the seeds of plants, bushes and flowers useful to the sustenance and reproduction of butterflies. Users will have the opportunity to become actively involved in the artistic process by following the instructions contained inside the spheres, and planting the seeds. The aim is to build the world’s largest vegetable sculpture. This intervention the first in a series of similar events that will be organized across a number of countries.

In the courtyard, the artist will build a display using the various plant species whose seeds are contained in the vending-sculpture spheres.

 

The ex-silos space will feature a projection of La Verde Utopia, a conversation between Ettore Favini, Alessandra Sandrolini and Gilles Clément – gardener, landscapist, theorist of the Third Landscape and the Plantary Garden, and supporter of biodiversity. This video addresses the main issues at the heart of Clément’s research: from the analysis of diversity in economic, ecological and social terms, to his project for a “realizable” utopia.

The project further anticipates the launch of a website where participants will be able to point out the exact location of the seeds they have planted, and upload the photos of the plants, thus contributing to the mapping of the vegetable sculpture.

In addition to purchasing seeds, participants will also be able to contribute to the development of the project by making a donation to the Banca Etica, in return for which they will receive a limited edition object created by the artist in collaboration with Canedicoda.

At the inauguration of the project will be presented in collaboration with the Roman study of architecture IaN +, invited by Emilia Giorgi, has designed the concept for the vending machines that will be located in the following areas of institutions, foundations, museums interested in joining the initiative Verdecuratoda.

An individual action can produce substantial changes only if it is repeated countless times, while countless micro-changes on a local scale can, if united, give life to large-scale transformation.

It would be great that the next spring, Rome is invaded by clouds of butterflies!

More info

website verdecuratoda

website Ettore Favini

Facebookpage

Photo credit © Ettore Favini

 

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Sunday's tale - A portrait of happiness: Balloons of Bhutan by Jonathan Harris

Sunday's Tale: a post from the past

In Bhutan happiness is, no laughing, matter-academics study it, spreadsheets track it, billboards tout it, conferences debate it, and every year, foreign intellectuals flock to Thimphu to share their ideas about what exactly makes a person happy.

Instead of "Gross National Product" Bhutan uses "Gross National Happiness" to measure it socio-economic prosperity, essentially organizing its national agenda around the basic tenets of Buddhism. Bhutan's fourth king, Jigme Singe Wangchuck, invented the idea in 1972, to give his tiny country some international guard against potential future invasion by its two mighty neighbors (India and Chine).

Given the seriousness with which this topic is treated, Jonathan Harris thought it would be fun to do something a little be silly, so in late 2007, he spent two weeks in Bhutan, handing out baloons. He asked people 5 questions pertaining to happiness: what make them happy, what is their happiest memory, what is their favorite joke, what is their level of happiness between 1 and 10, and, if they could make one wish, what would it be. Based on each person's stated level of happiness, he inflated that number of balloons, so very happy people would be given 10 balloons and very sad people would be given only one (but hey, it's still a balloon).

They wrote each person's wish onto a balloon of their favorite color. He repeated this process for 117 different people, from all different ages and backgrounds. On the find night, all wish balloons were re-inflated and strung up at Dochula, a sacred mountain pass at 10.000 feet, leaving them to bob up and down in the wind, mingling with thousand of stands of prayer flags..

Jonathan Harris is an artist and storyteller, he makes projects that reimagine how humans relate to technology and to each other. Combining elements of computer science, anthropology, visual art and storytelling, his projects range from building the world’s largest time capsule (with Yahoo!) to documenting an Alaskan Eskimo whale hunt on the Arctic Ocean.

More info

website Balloons of Bhutan

website Jonathan Harris

Photo credit © J. Harris

 

 

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Create without destroying: Carmina Campus, a fashion sustainable initiative

These are the days of the Milan Fashion Week, one of the things that has attracted the attention of Sustainable diary is Carmina Campus, a collection of handbags, jewels and furniture successfully combining the idea of ethical fashion and sustainable eco-friendly, with the great traditional Italian craftsmanship.

The brand was founded in 2006 by Ilaria Venturini Fendi, who explains "With Carmina Campus I tried to fashion a new approach, enriching the body of knowledge derived from my family history with values such as respect for the environment and the implementation of work projects aimed at social development"

The creations included in the collections are under the sign of reuse and upcycle, as Carbags line, bags made with seat covers, sun screens, safety belts recovered from car in shambles. Over the years the collection Carmina Campus made in Italy has been enriched by new materials. So switches are turned into sparkling Switch Bag and bottle caps become closures for Pyramid Bag, bags reversible with an inlay made of small pieces of leather processed in a pyramid. And then there are the old color charts, which take the form of soft Soft Bag.

While the items of the collection 100% made in Africa, successfully making concrete the philosophy “not charity, just work”. In Kenia Carmina Campus has given rise to the Ethical Fashion Initiative. The project has seen the involvement of some employees of craftsmen who have passed on their know-how to local communities through a process of training on site. So the brand has launched social projects that have the objective of training microentrepreneurs, promoting education and health care. The iniative was born from the collaboration of Carmina Campus with ITC (International Trade Centre), an agency of the UN and the World Trade Organization, whose mission is to provide developing countries opportunities for training and work.

More info

website Carmina Campus

Facebookpage

Photo credit © Carmina Campus

 

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