Here’s a Metro Map Made Out of Cans

Written by Jackson Knapp | Published on December 10, 2015

Late last month, the Washington Architectural Foundation sponsored its annual CANstruction contest, where participants spent six hours designing and builiding sculptures out of canned goods. The resulting structures were put on display at the National Building Museum for a week and voted on by a team of judges.

This year’s theme was transportation. Among the sculptures were a Metro system map, a Smart Car (called “Can2Go”), and a Chinook helicopter chopper. The buildings were made out of cans of mostly nutritious, non-perishable goods. (Boxes of distinctly unhealthy Pringles were used to hold up the roof one resembling Dulles International Airport.) And the transportation modes represented were not limited to those available in the Milky Way Galaxy. One of our favorites—a Millennium Falcon made from tuna cans and Goya products.

Photograph by Flickr user nevermindtheend.

“It’s all very silly,” said Mary Fitch, executive vice president of the Washington Architectural Foundation, “there are all sorts of puns about how we ‘can’ end hunger.”

Following the exhibit, the sculptures were taken apart and their cans donated to the Capital Area Food Bank. The CANstruction DC donated 68,313 pounds of food, $5,070 in donations, and an estimated 69,600 meals—a record for the event.