Crumple Zone, a site-specific installation, is utilising CNC-punchpressed steel with projected imagery to create a piece that challenges the preconceptions of the Vitruvian principles of stability, utility and beauty.

Crumple Zone

TYPE Installation
STATUS Commission, Built
LOCATION London, UK
YEAR 2004
CLIENT Factio 

DESIGN TEAM Eva Castro, Annelie Giencke, Ulla Hell, Holger Kehne, Christian Täubert

The installation was conceived for the inaugural exhibition by Factio, a not-for-profit collective promoting dialogue around British fashion, art, design, and architecture.
Plasma Studio created a spatially complex and multi-layered installation from a stack of standard industrial sheet steel with perforated seams arranged in a repeating pattern. By folding and connecting the standardized elements, a spatial sculpture emerges - the folding of the seemingly weakened (perforated) material allows for the formation of a stable structure. Under the influence of the curator, the site, and the structural form-finding process, the two-dimensional sheets were transformed into a three-dimensional construct.

The installation also mirrors traditional architectural work while initiating its own essential discussion, evolving from the role of providing surface and backdrop for the other exhibits.