UNIRSM News From the University of San Marino, six “solid poems” for those who will visit the Titan pavilion at Expo 2025 Osaka

From the University of San Marino, six “solid poems” for those who will visit the Titan pavilion at Expo 2025 Osaka

The prototypes emerged from one of the eight workshops curated by the Design degree courses last week

A small mountain of cardboard from which hand-embroidered fabrics are fished out, as if they were handkerchiefs, which, once ordered, visually compose the legend of Saint Marino. Cards on which words are written that make sense, and offer stories, only if reflected in a particular mirror. A postcard, made with the Japanese technique of kirigami, which when closed shows the profile of the three towers, while when opened it transforms, revealing the stairways of the historic center in three dimensions.

And again: a geographical map in recycled cotton that identifies on one side where the Titan is located on the global map, while on the other it reports information and curiosities about the territory of the republic. A paper theater that closes like an accordion to remember the history of the old train station, one in plexiglass dedicated to the passage of Giuseppe Garibaldi.

The six prototypes described, developed to be given away or marketed during the white and blue presence at Expo 2025 Osaka, are the result of one of the eight workshops that from Monday 9 to Friday 13 September involved around 150 students from various universities on the peninsula at the University of the Republic of San Marino, together with professionals and academics ready to develop a series of projects that fall within the activities and vocations of the degree courses in Design.

Specifically, one of the full-immersions concerned the products to be sold or donated during the event that will take place next year in Japan: “Our goal – explains the teacher Simone Spalvieri, active as a professional through a basic study in the Marche and mainly involved in the world of furniture and lighting – was to design light and economical objects that can be transported all over the world with ease, from which to bring out a fresh and contemporary story of San Marino and its realities. Simple in construction, we can describe them as solid poems”.

With the participation and contribution of 19 students, divided into groups and supported by the tutor Federico Giustozzi, “we used sheets and fabrics, together with Japanese manufacturing techniques, to convey concepts and ideas linked to the culture of the Titan”.

From the folds of the paper and the interpretation of other materials, little theatres and works were born that offer stories and suggestions: the prototypes will now be passed to the General Commissioner of the Government for the Universal Exposition, which will reserve the right to select the most suitable prototypes and evaluate their possible placement in the shop, among the freebies or even among the items exhibited in the pavilion during the Expo, available to guests and visitors.

Among the other workshops organized last week by the Design degree courses, gathered under the title Contamin_azioni Erranti 2024 and held in one of the university locations in the historic center, a collaboration with Technogym, an international leader in the production of sports and leisure equipment. There was also space for an in-depth study on the use of local natural fibers and materials in Rwanda for architecture and interior spaces, the creation of a video on the San Marino academic reality, the design of laboratories dedicated to the world of childhood, photography, brand design and brand protection.

Among the teachers Alessandro Piva, Ivana Pantieri, Paolo Marra, Mario Fedriga, Ermanno Tasca, Claudia Cantarin, Marcello Galvani, Nicole Marchi, Alice Cappelli, Alice Tasca and Francesco Mancuso. Tutors: Sara Giardi, Alex Giuliano, Raffaele Montemurro and Alice di Francescantonio.