Kartent

Last summer I was following the course D-exto, an interfacultair course organised by the TU Delft. D-exto is a pavilion with different projects to make people aware of sustainability and is traveling to different festivals in the Netherlands. One of the projects was the Kartent, invented by three guys. This project was a tent made of cardboard. In this column I want to make some advertisement about this progressive project. Because one of the most striking things of festivals is the waste left afterwards and every year a lot of tents are left at festival sites. The guys explained that one out of four tents is throwing away at the end of a festival. This can be of course more sustainable, so they invented the disposable tent. After the festivals, the tent goes directly to the paper factory, so they can be reused for toilet paper, textbooks, to make shoe boxes or something else!

The first time we went to a festivals, the organisation of the course told us that we had to sleep in a cardboard tent which was arranged for us. When we first saw them, they were a big folded cardboard. We had to lift them from a garage to an open field after a big rainy storm. One of the main questions we all were asking, was it waterproof? When we placed them on the wet field, they were fast unfolded and ready for using. On the inside it was dark, but also dry. We immediately put our sleping bags in it and went to sleep. The next day we woke up in a dry, cosy tent with no sunlight in our face. The cardboard worked isolated and kept the sun outside. Between all the tents made of fabric, the cardboard tents were unique. This made them attracting people. People were writing on it, want to look in it and were asking questions. After the first rainy and windy night, some people were asking if they also could use one of our tents.

This is also what is interesting for the future of the Kartent. At the moment the project is getting more famous and will be present at different festivals coming year. It is possible to buy a ticket for a festival and a kartent at the same time. Most interesting about the project is the awareness it is creating at the festivals. In my opinion festivals are really nice, but also far from sustainable. This project is one of the projects towards a sustainable festival.

If you want more information, you can find it on http://www.kartent.nl/kartent.php?p=1Home&l=nl