my design fix

Mafoombey Acoustic Space – Martti Kalliala & Esa Ruskeepää

Mafoombey is the title of an award winning corrugated cardboard sound installation designed by Finnish architecture students Martti Kalliala and Esa Ruskeepää with the aid of architect, Martin Lukasczyk.

Designed for a competition organised by the Helsinki University of Art and Design in 2005, the competition brief called for a space for listening to and experiencing music within the set dimension of a 2.5m cube.

Kalliala and Ruskeepää’s resulting design is a very sculptural form that plays on the contrast between the regular cubic volume, and the irregular free form interior, while also making use of the unique and underutilised material – corrugated cardboard.

The interior contours of the cube were designed mostly via 3D computer modelling. Once an appealing form was decided upon, the 3D model was sliced into horizontal layers in order to produce the cutting files for the computer-controlled cardboard cutter.

The structure itself consists of 360 layers of 7mm thick corrugated cardboard made up of 720 half-square sheets cut out one by one. Cardboard columns run through each corner of the  cube to stiffen the structure with cable runs and apertures for the speakers, DVD player and lamps all integrated within the stack.

Another impressive detail is the fact that no adhesives were used in the project! The installation is held together entirely by its own weight which lends itself to being a temporary structure – easily assembled and disassembled.

Mafoombey’s simple, yet playful form creates the ultimate listening and relaxing space, further enhanced by the sound-absorbing properties of a very eco-friendly material: cardboard.

via paperforest, iaac blog and finnish design shop