Visitors to the Replay event at the Design Museum during London Design Festival were able to participate in a game designed to make use of waste materials gathered from the city’s workshops.
Developed by Swiss architect Sébastien Tripod and the AA Material Arcade, Replay is a student-led initiative created to formalise the reuse ambitions of students within the Architectural Association School of Architecture.
Described as “an interactive architecture game”, it comprises scraps of materials including wood, foam and plastic tubing that can be combined to form a single three-dimensional sculpture.
“Addressed to adults and children alike, Replay questions reuse and its aesthetics, whilst demonstrating how playfulness invites creativity,” said the game’s creators.
“This game is a collective building site,” the designers added, “and an invitation to test and reflect on the aesthetics of reuse in architecture.”
Replay’s simple rules invite participants to take turns placing a block of salvaged material within the sculpture. Pieces that fall back down onto the wooden pallet base form a new foundation for building upon.
The only additional elements provided are several rolls of colourful tape. These are used to fix pieces together in such a way that they can be easily separated and reused when the game is over.
“Players must always work with the existing layout,” explained the project team, “leading to a shifting structure shaped by past and present participants – reflective of the process in the development of the project.”
The game was developed during the AA Summer School of 2024 in response to a brief set by the Swiss Embassy and the Design Museum that aimed to inspire creativity and community through the theme of play.
Tripod brought to the project his experience of working on self-built structures that make use of existing and available materials. For Replay, he helped to define an approach that promotes collaboration and awareness of material properties.
“Building is about giving people, but also materials, the opportunity to find places, to be accommodated for a while,” Tripod suggested.
“I like to think of it as a big construction game, where materials are placed and moved, and where elements remain adjustable for a closer relationship between the space and the inhabitant.”
The scrap materials used for Replay were sourced from makers around London and would otherwise have been destined for landfill. Models from the Architectural Association’s student projects were also deconstructed to provide additional materials.
“Questioning existing (linear) systems is at the core of the work of the AA Material Arcade,” explained designers Fergus Egan, Charlotte Wesselmann and Abhishek Wagle.
“Our initiative looks at material flows at the scale of a school and how subtle shifts in these systems can connect ‘waste’ with use and inspiration,” they added.
“This project is reflective of our practice, but rather than purely facilitating reuse we are our own customers, producing from materials we have salvaged.”
The AA Material Arcade was founded in 2021 by Diploma 18 students as a way to reduce the consumption of new resources by the school community.
It facilitates and promotes the exchange of materials, objects and tools, using an internal credit system to monitor the carbon savings from circulating materials.
According to the group, it saved 1.3 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent by reusing 345 kilograms of materials in the first term of the 2023-24 academic year.
Other installations at this year’s London Design Festival included objects made by designers including Sabine Marcelis and Ini Archibong in collaboration with Japanese artisans, a modular furniture showcase and an exhibition and auction of eyewear by designers and artists.
The photography is by Richard Heald Photography.
London Design Festival 2024 took place from 16-22 September 2024. See our London Design Festival 2024 guide on Dezeen Events Guide for information about the many other exhibitions, installations and talks taking place throughout the week.
