Canned food fights hunger

The theme of this year’s Canstruction at Valley West Mall in Des Moines may have been Heroes and Villains, but OPN Architects’ partners whose generous donations each year make it possible for our team to buy thousands of cans of food are truly the heroes.Thank you to McGough Construction, Raker Rhodes, Alvine, Confluence, Ryan Companies, Design Engineers, and Hy-Vee.

Because of their generosity, OPN was able to create the biggest villain of Super Mario World, Bowser. After 2,600 cans and over 2,500 pounds of food, Bowser rose from the famous green plumbers pipe to fry hunger. An assortment of spicy foods represented Bowser and his boiling hot personality, and at the end of the day the OPN team from our Des Moines studio took home the “Best Meal” award.

More importantly, though, all the cans were donated to local food banks through the Canstruction project, an annual competition and exhibition of structures made from unopened cans of food.

Since 1992, Canstruction® has contributed more than 17.5 million pounds of food nationally to community food banks, demonstrating that we can win the fight against hunger. This is the 10th year OPN has participated in Central Iowa Canstruction.

Sponsors: McGough Construction, Raker Rhodes, Alvine Engineering, Confluence, Ryan Companies, Design Engineers, Hy-Vee.
Number of cans used: 2,598
Ingredients: Black beans, green beans, red kidney beans, cannellini beans, crushed tomatoes, taco seasoning, Cheetos, Kool-aid
Award: Best Meal