As demonstrated by the exhibition “U-Joints” – curated by Andrea Caputo and Anniina Koivu during the last Fuorisalone – there are many ways to fasten elements and materials together. Invited to take part to the 2018 edition of the Concéntrico architecture and design festival, in Logroño (Spain), Jorge Penadés – a young Spanish designer that brings experimentation at the core of his work – used coloured gaffer tape to put together a series of plywood panels and create its temporary structure La Chabola.

Presented in the courtyard of the La Rioja library, the structure has complied with the festival’s technical requirements – creating a dismountable architecture using 20 standard wood panels and intervening as little as possible on the given material – giving proof of great resistance despite the lousy weather in the days of the event.
“The idea came during the research phase. I was exploring various possible removable solutions when duct tape came to my mind. I went to a specialised store, and they suggested me to use gaffer tape instead. In fact, parallel to having a textile grid that makes it structurally strong, gaffer tape leaves no glue residues on the surface on which it is applied”, affirms the designer.

The outcome of this experimentation was a small wooden architecture held together by yellow, blue and red tape. Assembled in only eight hours by Penadés and his assistant, despite the fragile and improvised appearance, the structure was strong and stable, just like a real chabola (slum, in Spanish). The designer, who is convinced that the system “could be applied to temporary homes for refugees and homeless people since it is easy to dismantle, transport and rebuild elsewhere”, is now planning to further explore its potential with a collection of furnishings and through other indoor applications. This also to reuse the twenty wooden panels that he recovered from the dismantling of La Chabola at the end of the Concéntrico festival.