You may remember earlier this year, Dewberry’s Fairfax office participated in the AIA Northern Virginia’s 8th Annual Canstruction competition—a contest where engineers, architects, students, and other design professionals create sculptures out of canned goods—and won an honorable mention.

Well, we’re at it again! Our Richmond office recently participated in a Canstruction competition in central Virginia. The theme—Space: The Final Frontier. SouperCanMan was our superhero, and he fought against Hunger with the slogan, “Faster than a speeding bouillon! More powerful than a pot of beans! Able to leap fields of French onions in a single pound!”

Despite being this office’s first time participating, we were able to collect enough donations for a total of 2,198 cans to build the structure. SouperCanMan was approximately six and a half feet tall, and four feet in diameter (plus his arms and cape). We used a variety of cans—vegetables (white and silver), tomato sauce (red), SpaghettiOs (blue), and assorted fruits (yellow)—which worked in our favor; we were honored with the Best Use of Labels award!

After the awards ceremony, we had the opportunity to tour the Central Virginia Food Bank facility—where the canned food was donated after the competition. Most of the shelves were bare, as funding has drastically been reduced, and there are more families than ever in need of help. It was humbling to see how our time and donations could really make a difference.