Perhaps you’ve never wondered what it would look like if 12,000 colored-pencils were shoved into a wall to form a color-gradient. That’s fine–but the folks at Toronto’s blackLAB Architects did, and unveiled the results at last month’s Interior Design Show (IDS) in Toronto.
Using the 25 colors found in a typical pack of colored pencils, the team tediously plugged each one into a grid, forming a spectrum that evolves from black to white, passing by a rainbow of shades along the way.
The installation was blackLAB’s response to IDS’s prompt “How do you work?”. They were handed over a shipping container and given free reign to bring that understated question to life. Early on in the project, the architects wrote on their blog: “While we start to think about the design for the installation we are asking ourselves, not only ‘how we work,’ but also ‘how we play,’ and ‘what makes a work space.'”
The resulting rainbow mosaic is, in fact, directly inspired by their work space: The one-year-old firm’s first major project was a makeover of their studio space–which involved the even more painstaking installation of 45,000 golf tees across a wall.
If perfectionism and attention to detail are “how you work,” this installation is a fitting visualization of that work ethos.