Wendy, the winning proposal from the architecture wunderkinds at HWKN is a bright blue, spiky, towering star in Long Island City’s MoMA PS1 courtyard. Even before construction began this summer, Wendy piqued the interest of Davis & Warshow, the New York City’s oldest and largest kitchen and bath distributor, and the German fittings manufacturer, Dornbracht, whose faucets are sold through D&W. The “temporary urban architecture” – the 13th installation of the Museum’s Young Architects Program –beguiled both companies with interactive water features designed to engage and cool visitors to the Museum’s popular courtyard parties plus its unusual sustainability story. The structure, now open through September 8, is sheathed in a special titania nanofilm-coated fabric that neutralizes airborne pollutants. In less than three months, Wendy will clean the air to an equivalent of removing 260 cars from the city’s congested streets.
For Davis & Warshow, this attention to sustainability made sponsoring Wendy’s construction a no-brainer. The company, headquartered less than three miles away in neighboring Maspeth, has a well-documented dedication to greening New York, with a
Practically Green program that spans everything from LED and solar installations in its 100-year-old warehouse to low-emissions vehicles for its sales staff.
D&W furnished plumbing components and technology necessary for its water features, which include cannons, mists and falling rain. D&W also worked with The Zoeller Company to specify and provide the 5 pumps powering Wendy’s system. Wendy also embodies Dornbracht’s long-term commitment to cultural platforms that are edgy, thought provoking and inventive. Since 2000, the company has explored the intersection of art and industry with its Culture Projects and Statements programs, creating and supporting dance, music, performances, art and installations around the globe that investigate the nature of design and architecture, eating, bathing and water, itself. The company’s sponsorship of Wendy marks a return to MoMA PS1, where it sponsored the exhibition Into Me/ Out of Me in 2006.
