FriendsWithYou Blows Up “Happy Rainbow” In Hong Kong

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FriendsWithYou has a knack for creating adorable color-loving characters, which are very often brought to life in the form of over the top vibrant inflatables. Samuel Borkson and Arturo Sandoval, founders of FWY, just launched their first exhibition in Hong Kong titled, Happy Rainbow. The 16 piece exhibit varies from a forty-foot interactive bounce house, to fiberglass, plush and resin sculptures, all unified to make an exhibit that is multi sensory and powerful in its complexity. Happy Rainbow is a sort of tangible dream land – described by FWY as “a place where all the colors of the rainbow come together to give you super magical play powers.”

It seems like the duo behind FWY can go from 2D to 3D with a quick snap of the finger. Borkson and Sandoval decided to give us a glimpse into the schematic phase of the Happy Rainbow exhibition, with their conceptual illustrations – which are art in itself. The joyous characters are first created on a two dimensional wonderland, then transformed into an interactive rainbow shrine. We caught up with Borkson and Sandoval, and decided to ask them some trivial questions, to get a better idea of who they are and how they work (note: Borkson and Sandoval answered the questions as one – which made us smile.)

KNSTRCT: If aliens came to our planet, and you could send only one person to be an ambassador, to talk them out of annihilating the human race, who would you send?

FWY: me

K: When you sleep at night, do you dream of the color spectrum? Do more than less objects in your dreams have smiley faces?

FWY: No, there are so many things that happen in dreams – so abstract or normal situations or magical ideas or things that are not quite explainable.

K: FriendsWithYou expresses their dream of pushing evil out of the world, we love this concept! What’s your game plan on kicking evil out?

FWY: I think we do this in our personal lives. We don’t want to kick out evil. Sometimes it’s necessary. We just want to arm people with power and increase love and magic between all people.