Inside Eden

Hardy delegates to next week’s Intersections conference in Cornwall will be spending the night under canvas in aid of charity Shelterbox, which provides emergency shelter and disaster relief.

Intersections, organised by Designs of the Time Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly, runs from 2-3 March, and on the first day, a team of designers led by Expedition Engineering founder Chris Wise will be constructing a Bedouin-style tent from 10 000 tent poles donated by Shelterbox and salvaged materials from Cornish Scrapstore and the National Industrial Symbiosis Programme.

The tent will be pitched in the Citrus Grove at the Eden Project’s Mediterranean Biodome, which sounds rather pleasant – though organisers say the temperature in the biodome can reach as low as -10ºC at night.

In a bid to keep the campers warm, textile designer Georgina Von Etzdorf will be working with Elsie Pinniger from Newquay company Neon Wetsuits to create beds, while Fresk – a collaboration between Rezolve, Boex 3D Design Solutions and Leap Media will be creating a ‘lounge’ for the tent.

Other donations to the ‘one-night hotel’ will include socks from Finisterre and soap from Trevarno Skincare.

The hotel will be open to the public during the daytime on 2 and 3 March, but on the evening of 2 March 15-20 of the conference delegates will be spending the night and will have entertainment from local musician Ryan Jones and a breakfast cooked by Llawnroc Hotel chef Neil Martin to look forward to.

Organisers say the aim of the enterprise is to raise money for and showcase the work of Shelterbox, which constructs temporary shelters for disaster victims, as well as to show how much ‘usable’ scrap that goes into landfill each year can be recycled and reused.