As per Rousseau’s on going work with the Ice Hotel we were invited to be part of an International team of Artists and Designers to create a huge Ice and Snow sculpture for a private showin the Grand Palais, Paris during Paris Fashion Week.

Wasted is a project conceived and curated by Arts Co, presented in the tunnel connecting the London Underground to The V&A, which sees architect Ian Douglas-Jones and designer Ben Rousseau create a vast architectural seating strata using materials reclaimed by E&KO. Wasted will interrogate a UK environmental problem – the tonnes of traditionally unrecycled waste that end up in landfill – and demonstrate how reclaimed materials can be used to create aspirational products. This project for the London Design Festival forms the launch of E&K Arts, a range of everyday, beautiful products created in collaboration with artists from waste.

In future millennia what will the strata of the UK look like if we continue to deposit 99 million tonnes of waste per year? According to DEFRA figures, 109 square miles of the UK is occupied by landfill. If this continues the UK will run out of landfill space in under nine years. What processes or opportunities are there for architects, designers and artists to use these materials heading for landfill, for the everyday, or in the urban landscape?

Tea drinking is a global past time, but a quintessentially British tradition. Raw leaves arrive on our shores from Argentina to Zimbabwe, shipped in foil lined paper sacks. These un-recyclable bags follow a linear path from ship to shore to factory to landfill; and by the thousands. Through innovative re-use of this refuse we can turn the ordinary into the extraordinary. Wasted showcases the throw away by-product of our penchant for tea, recomposed along with other disposables to form an immersive and jewel-like, semiprecious environment. The silver pleated tea-sack walls unfurl spilling dynamic seating strata made of re-claimed fire-hose.

Wasted at the V&A focuses on value and the re-valuing of things. Through reappropriation and re-composition we can change the perception and meaning of objects. This project for the London Design Festival is curated by Arts Co, with materials reclaimed by E&KO, and forms the launch of their joint venture E&K Arts.

Wasted at The V&A, London Design Festival, 19th to 27th September 2009

Opening Hours – 10.00 to 17.45 daily, 10.00 to 22.00 Fridays

Victoria & Albert Museum, Cromwell Road, London, SW7 2RL

What is E&K Arts?

E&K Arts is a partnership between E&KO, Elvis & Kresse Organisation run by James Henrit and Kresse Wesling, experts in the reclamation and re-engineering of waste, and Arts Co, an arts agency which nurtures art and design talent through a range of projects, run by Isabella Macpherson and Sigrid Wilkinson. These two young, respected companies have joined forces and announce with Wasted at the London Design Festival their plans for a luxury products range, from handbags to accessories, created by award-winning artists who have accepted the challenge to create luxury from waste.

E&K Arts works with artists to create products which are ethically and environmentally sustainable and have 100% design integrity. 50% percent of profits from E&K Arts will donated to charities associated with the waste streams.

For more information see www.arts-co.com / www.eako.com

Ian Douglas-Jones

Ian Douglas-Jones is a recently graduated with honours from The Royal College of Art, having received the Conran Foundation award as well as the New London Architecture Prize. Ian’s interests lie not only in architecture, but furniture and product design too. This fledgling designer recently launched design practice Atelier Apatura, as well as architecture, design, and conjecture site: www.i-n-d-j.com

Ben Rousseau

Ben Rousseau has been running his London based bespoke design studio since 2003, specialising in Interior architecture and 3 dimensional design. With a focus on high end aesthetics and precision engineering, Ben is currently developing a range of products and furniture items for both the home and the garden using recycled materials and components that would otherwise be deposited in land fill sites. Inspired by science fiction and futuristic manufacturing techniques Ben is conscious of the need to be more efficient with the way we use products and the way they are disposed of.

Recent clients include the Ice Hotel In Sweden, An eyewear store for Oakley in Bath and retail units for HMV across the UK. www.rousseau.co.uk

So I mentioned that I was out in the Arctic Circle. Well here is the result of INSA and Ben Rousseau’s latest collaborative work.
May I present to you: the INSA x ROUSSEAU ICE HOTEL ice suite.

“In a continuation of their shared love of high heel aesthetics the room’s main feature is two huge snow legs descending from the ceiling, wearing a pair of gigantic ice heels. Each heel, at over six foot high and two tonnes in weight was hand-carved from pure natural ice harvested from the Torne river.
Between the legs is the bed, crowned by an ecclesiastical arched window featuring an engraving of one of INSAs signature line patterns.
The rest of the room resembles something somewhere between a house of worship, gallery or boutique with more yonic arches housing smaller heel sculptures and other symbols of commercial wealth. ”

So that’s the room- now here are a few shots from the extremely taxing but very satisfying build and some from the trip. It was a truly amazing experience in a magical place.

Started off as just a plain shell of a room.

Along with chainsaws and ice chisels we routed INSA’s leg pattern into 10cm think ice blocks and filled the grooves with fresh snow to really enhance the contrast of the artwork.

The heart was one of 5 mini ice sculptures housed in the arches set into the walls of the room Also here you can get a nice clear view of one of the six foot high heels.

And yes we did join these guys in the crazy Scandinavian pastime of running naked through knee-high snow at minus 35 degrees.

Along with the other 18 amazing new artist suites this room is now available to stay in and will be untill it melts away around April this year….

Even in the far flung reaches of northern Sweden and in the most impractical of places, ladies are still rocking their INSA HEELS….

Thanks a lot to everyone involved in making this an awesome place and an awesome trip. And also thanks to Adrian Nordenbourg and Photo Big Ben for some of these great pictures.

Ice structure around bed with fibre optic lighting inon 3 colour slow change sequence, Control panel or table, frosted and lit with laser pod lighting pods designed by Chris Levine. All walls, ceiling and floor from snow.