Klein Architectural Graduate Sharon Shin and her 'Go Bananas' thesis project picked up the Bright Spot Award at the 2019 Resene Total Colour Awards! Congratulations!
Redesigning bus shelters using a simple recipe involving small pops of fun with a splash of rainbow and a spoonful of character!
This project was the final product of Sharon’s thesis (2018). This thesis involved redesigning a standard bus shelter to provide playful spaces throughout Auckland’s city centre.
Bus shelters have the potential to host small yet powerful interpersonal interactions, however in Auckland they only exist as utilitarian structures. Inspired by the film Forrest Gump, the aim of the shelter was to provide a platform for these interactions and to spark joy amongst people in the city.
Sharon employed the ‘Model-a-day Challenge’—a daily challenge that involved creating a new iteration of a shelter at 1:50 scale—which was employed as a task to allow for exploration of many different concepts, the Go Bananas shelter was born.
With the help of Klein Architects, Unique Creative, Scarbro Construction and All Good Bananas the final shelter came to life.
The bananas were presented at Artweek Auckland 2018 and World Park(ing) Day 2018. These installations involved activities such as the game Bananagrams, a banana smoothie exercycle, a bucket of flowers for people to share with strangers and playful tetris furniture for people to interact with whilst enjoying each other’s company.
