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Created for the 2016 Milan Design Week, MAD Architects’ “Invisible Borders” installation is part of the “Open Borders” exhibition curated by Italian magazine Interni. Taking place in the traditional Cortile d’Onore courtyard of Università degli Studi di Milano, the installation is a canopy made from ribbons of ETFE in gradient colors, which has a lightness and flexibility that allows it to rustle in the wind and generate a subtle whistling sound. According to MAD, “The installation reflects the hues of the sky during the day, leaving glimpses of the columns and loggias. In the evening it becomes a luminous surface that brings the courtyard to live with new colors.”
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“Borders are usually seen as something closed and unapproachable but I think it’s interesting to make borders attractive, dynamic and engaging,” says founder and principal of MAD, Ma Yansong. “So we decided to play with the border between the historical loggias and the garden in front of it, and design a transition in-between them.”
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MAD calls the installation a “sculptural gesture,” one “inserted to break the balance of the Cortile d’Onore and at the same time establish a new shelter...for people to engage in discussion or just contemplate the sky through the canopy.” Intent on creating a continuity between the installation and real-world flows like wind and water, Ma Yansong posits, “Our installation blurs the boundaries between the traditional and the contemporary. You see the difference in each end, but the transition is very organic. It’s like we open up a conversation between the past and the present.”
Design Team: Ma Yansong, Dang Qun, Yosuke Hayano, Andrea D’Antrassi, Hiroki Fujino
Engineering: Maco Technology srl, Roberto Maffei
Light Design: iGuzzini Illuminazione
Production: Ferrarelle
Material: P.A.T.I. ETFE Polymer
Dimensions: 31m * 16m * 14m
Photographs: Moreno Maggi
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“Open Borders” is part of Milan Design Week and runs from April 12-23, 2016 in the historic courtyard of the Università degli Studi di Milano.
