'Gecko: Think Forward'

With a clear focus on applications within high-value architecture the Swiss textile manufacturer Création Baumann created ‘Gecko’, an adhesive textile sunblind which can easily be mounted directly onto the window.

For the ‘Gecko: Think Forward’ competition Création Baumann invited international architects and designers to find innovative solutions which show the versatility of this novel material.
This month the best works in the categories ‘functionality’, ‘innovation’ and ‘aesthetics’ were awarded.

With her project ‘Gecko goes Kids’, which was awarded in the category ‘innovation’, the Zurich-based graphic designer Trix Barmettler took advantage of the fact that ‘Gecko’ can be used several times, because it leaves no residues and loses none of its adhesive power. Together with the children of the ‘Frechdachs’ kindergarten in Zurich she designed a flexible sun and visual blind which is composed of figurative elements of different dimensions.

The Kopenhagen-based architects Mette Ramsgard Thomsen und Aurelie Mossé of CITA – Center for IT and Architecture presented ‘Ice-fern’, a highly poetic and sculptural sun blind, which streches across the windows and walls. It was inspired by the natural phenomenon of the frost pattern and its artful cut and sophisticated pattern gives it a three dimensional appearance and creates an interplay with the surrounding architecture. The Danes received the award for the category ‘aesthetics’.

The award in the category ‘functionality’ went to Ahrens Grabenhorst Architekten from Hannover, Germany. For the interior design of the liberal Jewish community center in Hanover they used the white ‘Gecko Crypta’ in order to cover the 4,20m windows of the synagogue’s upper floor. “We were looking for a material that would give a certain mysticism to the space”, the architects explain. Thanks to the textiles structure the synagogue is filled with a soft and diffuse light – “a stringent project with great finesse”, the jury comments.