It’s massive, it’s slow-moving, and it’s completely terrifying to imagine it being used in battle. But Secret Operation 610 is designed to spread knowledge, not mayhem. This mobile classroom looks like a cold war relic, but functions as an ultra-modern space for university research.
Amsterdam-based creative office Rietveld Landscape was commissioned by the peace-loving folks at the Treaty of Utretcht Foundation, Province Utrecht and SKOR to imagine the “mobile sculpture”, which is parked inside of Shelter 610 at Soesterberg Air Base, a site established outside Utrecht in 1911 and operational until it was officially closed in 2008. Next year, it will become home to the country’s new National Military Museum (slated to open in late 2014), but in the meantime it’s forming new cultural roots.
Students at Delft University of Technology are currently using the lab as a space to work as they develop a program for silent, carbon-free flying. “The interior is designed in a way that people can work here in different ways,” Rietveld Landscape’s Arna Mackic tells Gizmodo. “The chairs are hinged and foldable and the table automatically comes out from the ceiling. Also there are two extra more relaxed seats in the head of the sculpture where the view is phenomenal.” And it doesn’t hurt that they have an old runway right outside that’s practically tailor-made for testing out their efforts. [Rietveld Landscape]
