Let's turn things around
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design for a World Expo Pavilion
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Overtreders W created the architectural design for the team that secured the second place in the bidding process for the Dutch pavilion at Expo 2025 Osaka. With our submission "Let's Turn Things Around," we showcase the Netherlands' vision for an attractive, clean, green, and joyful urban future. In a colorful and 100% circular pavilion, visitors collaborate towards a sustainable future by hopping on bicycles. People are at the heart of everything we do.
Inside the pavilion, visitors not only experience but actively participate. They embark on a cycling journey, exploring Dutch businesses, individuals, and collaborations that make the world a better, more sustainable, and enjoyable place. The pinnacle is the cycling platform, where visitors reveal a positive vision of a sustainable future by pedaling together.
The inviting pavilion is open, accessible, and crafted from familiar, tactile materials. Visitors feel encouraged to step inside and join the experience. The design draws inspiration from classic velodromes, circus tents, merry-go-rounds at the fair, and tea pavilions in parks.
We aimed to construct the fully circular pavilion on a solid foundation of rammed earth, utilizing locally excavated soil, tinted blue with Japanese indigo pigment. On this base, we designed a wooden tent-like structure adorned with a facade made of Suntex, an innovative architectural fabric developed by Studio Pauline van Dongen.
While it is unfortunate that this pavilion will not be realized, we take pride in our second-place achievement and gladly share a few visuals.
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Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Kubik, Overtreders W, Tinker Imagineers, Tentech, UrbanBerry
Osaka, JP
World Expo Pavilion
2nd prize
2023
1.059m2
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