An Israeli bank tries to sell “green mortgages” with installation exhibit on busy boulevard.
As part of their campaign to sell “green mortgages” (in other words, mortgages for homes built with environmentally friendly construction or for financing the installation of solar home energy systems), Bank Hapoalim has sponsored an exhibition of futuristic green homes along Tel Aviv’s Rothschild Boulevard. Rothschild Boulevard is often the venue for unusual exhibitions, including an installation of trees by environmental sculptor, Dani Karavan, a few years ago. This exhibition of 22 homes – all made by Israeli designers, artists, and architects – spans from Betzalel Yafe Street to Herzl Street. Some houses are scientific in nature, others are whimsical, and all of them are a little bizarre.
If you can’t make it to see the promenade of designs yourself, have a mini virtual tour right here:
My Tree House by Moshe and Dafna Kastiel (pictured to the left) is a metal construction surrounding an existing tree on the boulevard. In the artists’ own words, the design “emphasizes the necessary relationship between home and nature, even in the center of a city.”
Purchasing Group by Philip Renzer (pictured at the top of this article) is made from recycled wood and found objects. According to the artist, the work depicts a “portable wooden house that is a modest version of a caravan-car. The home is reminiscent of the wooden cars that we used to build as children out of found wooden parts and wheels that were removed from cars. The house adapts itself to a modern lifestyle that necessitates constant movement, and is an alternative to wasteful, industrial construction.”
Eco-section-cut by Noam Dover and Michal Tsaderbaum (image on the right) presents not only design, but functional energy usage. Its solar panels and wind turbines generate energy for the house, and the design also integrates greenery.
Other green designers whose works are exhibited are Brigitte Cartier (who also designed the Visitor’s Center at Hiria) and Studio Mesila.
The exhibition is on view and open to the public until May 8th.
Read more about green housing::
Is Safdie’s Habitat ’67 a Viable Model for Middle Eastern Urban Housing?
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I don't know if you guys noticed but, by occupying the pedestrian part of the street, Hapoalim's corporate exhibition has pushed masses of pedestrians into Rothschild Boulevard's bike lane. Ironically, the municipality just put up huge posters, with slogans along the lines of “some things just don't mix,” calling on pedestrians to keep off the bike lane. Little bit absurd, and a bit of a shame, since the bike lane is way greener than anything I saw in the exhibition…