Can LOVE sign break the Guinness World Record?

By far the most ambitious letter “L” we’ve ever seen.

April 15, 2014; 1:38 PM • by Nathan Cushing

Update #2 — April 15, 2014; 1:34 PM

Organizers behind the LOVE sign made of aluminum cans that seek to break a Guinness World Record (see below) have released this photo of the L:

The full sign will be unveiled at Earth Day Richmond on April 26th.

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Update #1 — April 4, 2014; 11:17 AM

Here are the locations where people may donate their aluminum cans to the project:

Whole Foods • 11173 W Broad Street
17th Street Farmers Market • 100 N. 17th Street
City Hall • 900 E. Broad Street
The Pig and Pearl • 2053 W. Broad Street
Hardywood Park • 2408 Ownby Lane
Seven Hills School • 1311 Overbrook Road
Ellwood Thompson • 4 N. Thompson Street
The Byrd Theater • 2908 W. Cary Street
Black Hand Coffee • 3101 Patterson Avenue
Urban Farmhouse • 310 N. 33rd Street
The Market (Farm Fresh) • 2320 E Main Street
Sub Rosa • 620 N. 25th Street
Proper Pie Co. • 2505 E. Broad Street
VCU • 835 W Grace Street
Urban Farmhouse • 13872 Coalfield Commons Place
River City Recycling • 1207 School Street

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Original — April 04, 2014

Sculptors will try to break the record for the largest aluminium can sculpture by welding 110,000 cans into a LOVE sign. That sign will be unveiled at the Earth Day Richmond on April 26th.

“We wanted to do something that shows something our love of the planet and our commitment to sustainable practice and environmentalism itself,” said John Sydnor, executive director of Enrichmond, the nonprofit backers of the annual Earth Day festival.

Enrichmond partnered with Prabir Mehta of My Glasses Rule, a local marketing and consulting, and others to create the “Save the Cans” project.

“The can aspect, I think is a simple one,” Mehta said. “It’s a powerful and feasible goal to reach as a state and nation…to give [aluminum cans] a recycled and second life.”

Roughly 110,000 local cans will be resurrected into the largest aluminium can sculpture on the books with Guinness World Records¹ with the help of two sculptors.

“There’s going to be a lot of compacting, compressing, and sawing involved,” Mehta said about the sculpture. River City Recycling and TFC Recycling will collect the cans and “smush them to the most compact raw block that we can work with.” He said that the recycling centers will use available equipment² to count the number of cans used to ensure the Guinness World Record is broken.

Enrichmond asks that Richmonders donate their aluminum cans to the project. Drop-off locations will be announced soon. People can also follow the project online using #savethecans.

Staying true to the nature of recycling, organizers will recycle the LOVE sign sometime after it’s unveiled in late April. In addition to the LOVE sign unveiling, the Earth Day Richmond festival will feature a faux house comprising recycled items, plus food and vendors. Sydnor and Matta said the goal of the festival is to get people thinking about how easy and beneficial recycling is.

Earth Day Richmond takes place on Saturday, April 26th in Shockoe Bottom.

photo by Mel Kobran

The largest aluminium can sculpture consists of 104,840 cans and was created by Junior Chamber International Toyohashi at Toyohashi Park in Japan on September 21, 2013. ↩
That weighs each block and then uses that weight to calculate the number of cans used. ↩