The Amazingly Charitable Canstruction is Back at the Winter Garden in Battery Park City

Palm trees tower high over the Canstruction entries on display at Battery Park City's Winter Garden.

Ask a bunch of the city's top design, engineering, and architectural firms to build something crazy using only cans of food and, unsurprisingly, you get some pretty spectacular results.

Now in Canstruction's 21st year, the Design/Build Competition not only scores high on the WOW factor for spectators of all ages, but because all of the building materials–aka, food–are donated to City Harvest at the end of exhibition (and thus on to some 400 community programs throughout NYC), it also does a whole lot of immediate good for tens of thousands of New Yorkers. An amazing stat: the 26 sculptures in Canstruction 2013 were created using 96,751 cans of food, all of which goes directly to City Harvest. 

Canstruction entry entitled "Polarized Against Hunger" by GACE Consulting Engineers, which includes a penguin sitting outside of an igloo, all made out of cans

Our Favorite Canstruction Entries

Returning to the soaring Winter Garden within Battery Park City's Brookfield Place, as well as taking over the lobby at 200 Vesey Street (there are lots volunteers to tell you how to get there, which isn't as easy as you might think, given all the construction), Canstruction 2013 features the same sort of jaw-dropping engineering, cartoonish designs, and terrible puns as in year's past. I went on opening day and, while of course I appreciated every entry–really, even the most unimaginative pieces are still pretty cool–definitely had my favorites, including Polarized Against Hunger by GACE Consulting Engineers, above, as well as these: 

Canstruction entry entitled "Stack'Can Island Ferry" by MTA New York City Transit, which is a rendition of a red ferry cruising the water, all made out of cans

Stack'Can Island Ferry, by MTA New York City Transit 

Very unique Canstruction entry of two dogs sipping up a spaghetti, a rendition of The Lady and the Tramp, by Arup

Bella notte per finire la fame (starring Lady and the Tramp), by Arup 

Tuna and Goya bean can create this raining cloud Canstruction entry, called "Cloudy with a Chance of Tuna", by Gilsanz Murray Steficek

Cloudy with a Chance of Tuna, by Gilsanz Murray Steficek LLP 

Man made out of cans that is reaching in and opening up his chest on display at the Canstruction exhibition, entitled "Pour Your Heart Out" by Leslie E. Roberts Associates

Pour Your Heart Out, by Leslie E. Roberts Associates 

Canstruction entry based off the lovable minion characters from the movie "Despicable Me" created by Perkins Eastman / Harlem RBI

Despicable Hunger: Minions CanRise!, by Perkins Eastman / Harlem RBI  

More Information: Canstruction NYC 2013

Canstruction NYC 2013 will be at the Winter Garden (and various spots in the Brookfield Place lobby) from now through November 13. For more information, see the Canstruction New York Facebook page!

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