March 2009

IA and Pioneer Construction took Aim at Hunger in the recent inaugural Kendall College of Art and Design / Miller Canfield Law Firm Canstruction event.

Using canned and packaged food goods for construction materials, teams from across the city gathered in the Kendall College lobby to compete in the unique design contest, creating structures that would be displayed to the community and then donated to the Grand Rapids Salvation Army’s Booth Family Services food pantry.

The event garnered 13,000 cans of food, 34% of it coming from the IA/Pioneer effort which provided 2040 Cans of Joan of Arc Kidney Beans and 2448 cans of Bush’s Best Chili.

“While we are all about design, we wanted this project to be all about sharing with the community,” Scott Vyn, Director of Design explained. The design effort began with a call to the Salvation Army to identify the most needed canned foods, which turned out to be canned vegetables and meat products. With that in mind, our goal was to create a simple structure that would use the largest possible number of cans. Working through several mini-mockups, the design team looked back in time for inspiration, and recreated the screen of the vintage Atari Space Aliens video game, which used laser cannons to shoot evil aliens.

The two dimensional video graphic was created by carefully positioning the cans to replicate the iconic Space Alien image on an eight-foot tall video screen. Blue and silver can lids continued the video screen on the horizontal plane while creating the canon and laser beam images.

Stabilizing the 8-foot-tall wall offered the greatest challenge and was solved by creating triangular can columns, connected by clear packing tape. The Canstruction took over six hours of careful can composition and earned an Honorable Mention award. The Space Alien can-graphic now advances to the national competition.

Special thanks to:

Acosta Sales and Marketing Company
Joan of Arc Kidney Beans, B & G Foods
Bush’s Best’s Best Chili

Can-Struction Volunteers:

Professional
Integrated Architecture
Adam Clark
Dave Huizenga
Randy Pease
Trisha Spaulding
Scott Vyn and sons
Arend and Aidan

Pioneer Construction
Alyssa Matthysse
Mark Karelse

Student
Kendall College of Art & Design
Sara Fifarek