IE Paper Pavilion
by Shigeru Ban

Japanese architect Shigeru Ban has completed a temporary pavilion made from cardboard tubes at the IE School of Architecture and Design in Madrid.

The Paper Pavilion, which was inaugurated yesterday, is constructed in the university’s Serrano garden and will serve as a multi-purpose space for events, meetings, talks and exhibitions.

The project had a restricted budget, so Shigeru Ban designed a system of cardboard roof trusses and columns which were cheap to install and can be easily recycled when the building is eventually dismantled.

The tubes were manufactured and waterproofed locally in Spain and were assembled by members of the surrounding community.

The IE School commissioned the pavilion, supported by the Japan Foundation. The opening event was a lecture by Ban entitled “Appropriate Architecture”.

Tokyo architect Shigeru Ban has used cardboard to construct a number of pavilions and structures in recent years, which ties closely to his work on disaster relief projects. He is currently working on a cardboard cathedral in Christchurch, New Zealand, and has also built a pavilion with cardboard columns in Moscow and a temporary tower made of paper tubes.

See more architecture by Shigeru Ban on Dezeen or see more design with cardboard.

Photography is by Fernando Guerra.

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• Architecture