peaceBOMB: “Buying Back” the Vietnam War

During the Vietnam War, the US dropped an average one B-52 bomb load every 8 minutes, 24/7, for a total of 2 million tons of ordnance, making Laos the most heavily bombed country in the world. peaceBOMB is an inspired project aiming to “buy back the bombs” and deploy them in the pursuit of sustainable socio-economic development for artisans in rural Vietnam through a collection of bracelets made of aluminum war scrap metal.

The project raised $7,000 on Kickstarter last fall to create video documenting Vietnamese artisans’ constructive approach to the devastation of war since the 1970s by repurposing bomb metal into spoons and, now, bracelets.

The initative is the product of a partnership between Swiss NGO Helvetas and Brooklyn-based design enterprise ARTICLE 22.

via TBD

Maria Popova is the editor of Brain Pickings, a curated inventory of miscellaneous interestingness. She writes for Wired UK, GOOD Magazine and Design Observer, and spends a shameful amount of time on Twitter.