It’s not always “business as usual” here at Spiral Paper Tube & Core. We recently had the opportunity to work with two greats, Yunhee Min, an artist, and architect Peter Tolkin, both working in collaboration with the University of California, Riverside.

Unlike most other custom orders, theirs called for thousands of light blue paper tubes, dark blue paper tubes, bright yellow paper tubes, forest green paper tubes, followed by an array of pinks, reds and oranges…all with a clean, flat white inside liner.

In addition to the fluctuating colors, the lengths were just as varied.

After numerous intriguing conversations, we felt we had an understanding of their project and began bringing in the custom colored paper. And, truth be told, the colors lit up our factory like never before!

Here’s the what the LA Times had to say about their art installation:

Inspired by the writings of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, who described music as “liquid architecture” and architecture as “frozen music,” Min and Tolkin have created an installation that fills the UCR Arts atrium with an undulating form constructed out of 150-foot bands of fabric and more than 17,000 colored paper tubes.

The installation runs through December 29. The opening reception was held September 29 at UC Riverside, 3824 and 3834 Main St., Riverside, ucrarts.ucr.edu.

“Yunhee Min & Peter Tolkin: Red Carpet in C is a collaboration between painter, Yunhee Min, and architect, Peter Tolkin. The idea for this project evolved out of Min and Tolkin’s shared enthusiasm for music, architecture, and color. These interests let them to Goethe who described the relationship between architecture and music as “Music is liquid architecture; Architecture is frozen music.”

Conceived as performative architecture, this large fabric installation functions as both an object to be viewed and a space to be inhabited; a virtual translation of music into three-dimensions. Constructed of fabric and colored paper tubes, its soft, undulating parabolic shape is set in visual relief against the classical proportions, meter, and time signature of Culver Center of the Arts’ historic atrium.

The team that made possible Red Carpet in C