An innovative design project generates clean air in polluted cities and produces stunning jewelry in the process.
Image: Derrick Wang
Not from this earth
The Smog Free Tower looks quite futuristic but its purpose is quite grounded: Provide clean air.
Image: Derrick Wang
Filtering the ambient air
Inside the tower is a highly-efficient air filter that consumes very little energy but catches even ultrafine particles. As a result, the air around the tower is up to 75% cleaner than in the city that surrounds it.
Image: Derrick Wang
A place to breathe freely
Obviously, one tower alone cannot clean the air in the entire city. The idea is more to inspire and provide a space where people can gather, think and breathe freely, even in some of the most polluted cities in the world - in this case, Beijing.
Image: Laard Buurman
What to do with the dirt?
Since Roosegaarde believes in a future where waste does not exist, he had to find some use for the fine particles of pollution that the Smog Free Tower filters out of the air.
Image: Studio Roosegaarde
Something precious
Roosegaarde's team decided to take the fine particles and compress them for 30 minutes, before encasing them in acrylic. The result is a stunning cube that gets turned into jewelry like this "Smog Free Ring."
Image: Studio Roosegaarde
A bold vision
The man behind the project, Dutch designer Daan Roosegaarde wants nothing less than a human right to clean air.
The Smog Free Tower looks like a spaceship that has touched down in a city park. The brainchild of Dutch designer Daan Roosegaarde, the tower is seven meters tall and completely encased in shiny metal, its purpose is to filter pollution out of the ambient air. But what happens afterward is perhaps even cooler.
