Ingarden & Ewý Architects, Wicker Sculpture. Installation view at Palazzo Mora, 2016.

Wicker sculpture: Materiality & Light
The wicker mesh sculpture is a semi-transparent “lantern”. The light placed inside the form penetrates the delicate surfaces and invites visitors to come closer, to experience the material by touching it. It invites for intimate visual and haptic perception. The sculpture is made of manually-woven wicker nets on steel frames, designed and spatially formed with the use of the latest 3D computer modelling technology – is therefore a unique combination of ‘high-tech’ design methods with ‘low-tech’ production technology. Suitably formed, the various steel frame modules are designed as enclosures for light. The form and its production method try to rebuild the long-disturbed relations between man, nature and architecture. Wicker lantern represents its time, it is the artefact done within its cultural context and space, and thus – refers to the essence of human existence.
Wicker weaving: Nature & Culture
Our experiments with wicker started about 10 years ago. In the year 2005 “Nature’s Wisdom” was the leading theme of the EXPO held in Nagoya, Japan. This term was close to the idea of sustainable development understood as a balanced development of human civilisation and the environment in which it operates, both natural and cultural. On that occasion, during the design of the Polish Pavilion, we started to consider wicker as a material to be used on elevation. Among traditional materials, we found it the best among other materials being capable of carrying the idea of nature and culture, handicraft and Polish music, represented by the composer Frederick Chopin. The key reference for this concept we found in Chopin’s Statue in Warsaw’s Łazienki Park, where the composer is portrayed under a willow tree. This image, as well as the association of Chopin’s music with the Mazovian landscape and willows, (an association that is universal in Poland) provided an impulse to look for a method to use willow withies to form the elevation of the building. Wicker (Salix Sp.), being a variety of willow, proved a perfect material for this purpose. Namely, when woven, it is susceptible to spatial forming, and it also ties in with the Polish tradition of arts and crafts and the legacy of regions that have specialised in weaving wicker products for many decades. Wicker, as a material per se, carries a message that other typical building materials are deprived of. In the public's perception, the material’s thematic references to music, natural landscape, and handicraft traditions are comprehensible, and, at the same time, they are intelligible in relation to the message related to ecological solutions and the idea of sustainable development.