We are Assemble Papers, a Melbourne, Australia-based weekly online and biannual print publication about small footprint living, covering art, design, architecture, urbanism, the environment and finance. Each year we partner with MPavilion, an annual architecture commission and free four-month public program of events, to produce a special edition of our publication and to present a series of events that tie in to our values and ideas.

A key focus of the 2016/2017 MPavilion program is the intersection of design and science, which we were invited to explore through our events. We are particularly keen to promote citizen science action, empowering our local community with some tools to contribute to a better understanding of their city and in turn better urban design. We came across the great work of Public Lab a while back and it inspired us to do an awareness-raising event about balloon mapping.

DATE CHANGE DUE TO WEATHER This event will now take place on Thursday 15 December at 7.30am AEDT (weather permitting) – we will be hosting a balloon mapping workshop at MPavilion so that we can demonstrate the technique and explain how it can be used to contribute to the social and environmental issues that affect us. If any Melbourne-based Public Lab-ers are reading and would like to come along, please read more and RSVP HERE.

Below are a few photos from our balloon test flight on Tuesday 6 December. Conditions were excellent – it was a perfectly still morning, which sent our balloon soaring smoothly above us. We are limited by local legislation to keep the balloon within 400ft, but still managed to capture some great photos of MPavilion and surrounds at this height.

Before next week we'll be going back to the drawing board on our PET bottle rig. We're working with a GoPro Hero3+ and I don't think we've got the set-up quite right to keep it stable. If you have any tips, please let us know :)