By Celsias Team
Christchurch , did you realise how trendy the containers that are everywhere in the city are? We notice they are now popular in Merivale even.
But beyond that , Starbucks is also about to unveil a new store in suburban Seattle built primarily of four used shipping containers .
Containers have become the "in" thing in the green building movement because so many of them are piling up at American ports and are in need of recycling, says Peter DeMaria, the principal in a design firm that does a lot of work with them. “Due to the trade imbalance with China, millions of containers are left in our ports every year,” he said.
“We like the idea of up-cycling, that is, using a material and deploying it in nearly its original state,” Mr. DeMaria said. Adapting a container takes 5 percent of the energy needed to take steel, melt it down and create a new beam, he added.
According to a company spokesman, Alan Hilowitz,the Starbucks container story is a prototype- which means it may lead to more container stores.
And it will be portable, he said, easy to break it down and transport somewhere else. “We see a lot of opportunities here,” he said. “We can put a store like this on a lot that will be developed someday but is free for two or three years, and then we can move it.”
The company, he said, was also motivated by the idea of not letting the containers it uses for importing tea and coffee just sit and go to waste.
See just how trendy you are Christchurch !
