There are 9 days left before the inauguration of Expo 2015 in Milan dedicated to the theme "Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life" (May 1st – October 31st). We continue our virtual tour that we started on First on line last February 19 with the visit to the pavilions of the European countries.
GERMANY
The German pavilion project, “Fields of Ideas”, extended to 2.680 square meters, is characterized by the architecture that recalls the typical German rural landscape, made up of meadows and fields, in the form of a gently sloping plateau. The central representative elements of the Pavilion are the stylized plants which, like "shoots of ideas", emerge from the exhibition floor and reach the external surface where they open up in a large canopy, thus linking the internal space to the external one, the exhibition with the architecture.
Inside the pavilion, the visitor's journey starts from the sources of food to food production and consumption. Different representations of the topic, the exhibition material and the information points present some German proposals for the future of food. Visitors are encouraged to actively participate. Thanks to the “SeedBoard” each visitor has his own "field of ideas" in his hands to interact with the material on display and get more multimedia information. The “Be(e) active” show it is the grand finale of the exhibition. Visitors to the pavilion transform themselves into musicians in an orchestra and watch the German world of food from the vantage point of two bees in flight. The cultural program of the German Pavilion will showcase the cultural diversity of Germany. The Schmidhuber studio, from Munich, signs the design of the spaces, the architecture and the master plan. Milla & Partner, from Stuttgart, is responsible for the planning of the contents, the staging and the different exhibition mediums. Nussli, from Roth near Nuremberg, is responsible for project management and the construction phase.
AUSTRIA
The Pavilion combines the structure and the environment, forming a frame around a large forest. With a technical support (but without an air conditioning system), the circumscribed form actively reproduces the microclimatic condition of an Austrian forest. Inside the built structure, where the light penetrates, there is growth and ecological metabolism. The forest vegetation has a total foliar or evaporation area of about 43.200 m² and produces 62,5 kg of new oxygen per hour, the needs of 1800 people. Furthermore, the evaporation will refresh the air inside the pavilion. A concrete testimony of the sustainable reforestation policy pursued by Austria. The Austrian area, 1.910 square meters, it is located near the crossroads of the main axes (Cardo and Decumanus), opposite the pavilions of Germany and Switzerland and close to that of Slovenia. From the terrace of the Austrian Pavilion, we overlook theOpen Air Theater, with its 9.000 seats, where official ceremonies, shows and concerts will take place. During the EXPO period, each country will have the opportunity to present itself exclusively in the context of a day dedicated to individual nations. In addition to the events in the Pavilion, events will also take place throughout the EXPO area and in the city of Milan. 26 June 2015 will be a day entirely dedicated to Austria and will culminate with a concert by the Wiener Philharmoniker (conductor: Mariss Jansons) at La Scala in Milan.
GREAT BRITAIN
The United Kingdom shows visitors its pavilion, extended over 1.910 square meters, the news and innovations achieved in every link in the food chain, from seed to plate, from the field to the table. Agricultural technologies, food safety, food and beverages, functional foods, logistics, openness to global markets, international collaborations. The pavilion's design is inspired by the unique role beehives have in our ecosystem. Wolfgang Buttress, the winner of the competition launched to choose the architecture of the pavilion, translated the tradition of British design in compliance with the most advanced ecological requirements. Responsible for the construction of the pavilion. the team of construction engineers and builders of Stage One and Rise.
SPAIN
The pavilion that develops on a lot of 2.533 square meters it was designed by the B720 Arquitectos studio led by Fermín Vázquez. External and internal spaces interpenetrate, with a prevalence of open-air areas where you can relax between the patio of the orange trees (tree symbol of the Iberian identity) the chiringuito and the auditorium. The idea of coexistence between tradition and innovation takes shape in two large blocks of flats side by side, one composed of wooden structures and the other in steel, each of which contains themed products, exhibition spaces and illustrative materials. Given its transitory nature, everything is inspired by the concept of temporary architecture with the use of sustainable materials and prefabricated modules, which can be dismantled at the end of the event. The unifying message of “language of taste” is offered to visitors in three successive zones – territory, products, gastronomy – through different types of experiences, such as the use of QR codes and digital scenography, thematic animations, cooking areas, hydroponic gardens, shops and a vegetable garden didactic. Finally, the visitor will be able to taste the typical dishes of the Iberian cuisine thanks to a tapas bars and a restaurant. The artist Antoni Miralda will create an installation on the theme "The journey of food".
SWITZERLAND
Switzerland, the first country to have joined Expo Milano 2015, is proposing in its pavilion a reflection on the scarcity of food resources in the world and shows the other side of abundance. The pavilion, in fact, consists of four towers filled with local foodstuffs: water, salt, coffee (it has become Switzerland's main export food product, overtaking chocolate and cheese) and apples. The visitor will be able to draw freely, but there is a limit to the available resources, exceeding it means depriving other visitors of the same possibilities. Thanks to the modularity of the structure, as the towers empty, the level of the platforms on which they rest drops, thus allowing the public to visualize their behavior in relation to consumption.
The pavilion, which covers an area of 4.432 square meters, combines industrial elements and tradition and is the result of a project by the Netwerch GmbH Brugg studio. While the towers, in their function as warehouses, recall the world of technology and machines, the wooden terrace and the buildings with gabled roofs allude to traditional Swiss villages. Much of the Swiss Pavilion has freely accessible areas in which visitors can move as they please, but there is a ticket system for the route through the food towers located in the centre. Once the Universal Exposition is over, the towers will be reused in Swiss cities as urban greenhouses. 75 percent of the material used in the Swiss Pavilion and its infrastructures will be able to be recovered at the end of the event. Switzerland's total investment in the Event is around 40 million Swiss francs.
Also not to be missed is a stop in the Holland pavilion organized as a joyous amusement park. And at the delicious Belgian pavilion (chocolate, french fries and fantastic beers). Green break in the Irish pavilion. The presence of central-eastern European countries is massive: Poland, Romania, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Slovenia have their own stands, often of excellent quality. Like the ambitious Baltic republics of Estonia and Lithuania. Serbia, Montenegro, and Albania, together with Greece, are guests of the respective Clusters (see First on Line of last April 15th) Almost all of the republics of the former Soviet Union: the European Belarus and Moldavia and the Asian Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan (in the Uzbekistan and Kyrgystan clusters). Among the small European states, the Pavilion of the Holy See and the Principality of Monaco stand out (San Marino and Malta are in the Bio-Mediterranean Cluster).
