Fridge-free life is cool

Money can be a bit thin on the ground when you’re a struggling artist, which may be what inspired Jihyun Ryou to make do without a fridge. After all, electricity isn’t getting any cheaper.

Actually, the idea of getting closer to our food by relying less on technology was more of an inspiration, says the Korean artist, who has come up with some thought-provoking pieces that store fruit and vegetables without refrigeration.

Fridges actually make some vegetables (the ‘fruit-vegetables’ such as eggplants and tomatoes) decay quicker, says Ryou, whose grandmother was an apple grower.

Drawing on traditional ways of keeping food fresh, she has come up with a box in which carrots are stored in sand (the constant humidity helps them keep longer), a perforated fruit bowl that keeps the produce cool by sitting over a bowl of water, and a container that stores potatoes (in the shade) with apples (in the light): the ethylene released by the apples stops the potatoes sprouting.