Group of 30 innovative “young” thinkers live and work together to foster creativity!

You can call it a meeting of the minds, or call it a six-week slumber party for inspirational “young” people under 30. Whatever you want to call it, this six-week long green initiative designed by 45 Kilo and the ZWEIDREI is called AWESOME in my book.

Photo from flickr


Okay, it’s really called Palomar5. Why do I think that this is awesome initiative? Here are a few reasons:

• The website says: “Palomar5 seeks out the most visionary young people internationally and then assembles them to inspire each other naturally. A highly selective application process aims to bring together a sensible mix of nationalities, genders, and professions to create a diverse and nascent network of movers and shakers from all kinds of backgrounds with a broad variety of skills and interests.” That got me.
• An old factory in Berlin was reused to provide shelter for the young residents.
• Each resident got their own “cube”:  one to sleep in and one to work in.
• The “cubes” were made from recycled scrap wood, and no glue was used.
• All of the cubes were connected together to foster creative and social interaction with other residents.  (I assume they talked about stuff like the meaning of life, nuclear power, global warming and Tiger Woods).
• Once the residents left, the entire Palomar5 structure was broken down and recycled.

Here’s a picture of the space being built:

Photo from Palomar5

And here’s an “after” picture of each resident’s living space:


Photo from Inhabitat

The residents were split into “creative groups” to come up with exciting and new project ideas. Here’s one group that came up with the idea to inspire young people through the legend of King Arthur.

King Arthur's Table from Palomar5 on Vimeo.

You can see a cool set of pictures from the entire creative event here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/palomar5/sets/72157622471696229/show/

I think that this is a great idea, and it also happens to promote green building materials, which is very cool to me. This initiative should happen again, and a wider age range of participants should live in the factory together. I love to see people of all ages fostering creativity in one another.