Last Saturday, 18 September, I was invited to Berlin to judge a new Guinness World Records attempt. Trenntstadt Berlin, a project dealing with waste prevention and recycling in Berlin, had enlisted 180 volunteers to construct the largest litter bin mosaic. The attempt was organised as part of ‘Clean Tech World’, a trade fair focussing on renewable energy sources and recycling. The venue was the airfield of the impressive former Tempelhof Airport.When I arrived at the airfield I immediately saw rows and ro
ws of different coloured wheelie bins, used for separating recyclable materials. Volunteers began wheeling the bins into place, following the plan which had been chalked out on the tarmac. The image took shape in no time as some volunteers wheeled 4 bins at a time!At around 2pm I was taken to a high vantage point where I could see the mosaic in all its glory. It depicted a polar bear, one of the species most at risk from global warming due to melting polar ice, its natural habitat.
As this was the first time this record had been attempted, Guinness World Records had set the minimum number of bins at 1,000 in order for the mosaic to qualify. The counting took a while, but finally I arrived at a result and prepared to announce whether or not this had been a successful Guinness World Records attempt. The huge litter bin mosaic consisted of a total of 6,401 bins, and I presented an official Guinness World Records certificate to mark the occasion.
Source - guinnessworldrecords
