Land Rover's luxury SUV, the Range Rover turned 45 this year. To celebrate the anniversary, the British automaker drove its flagship Range Rover SUV across a bridge made of paper in the ancient water city of Suzhou, known for its bridges. This highlight drive was accomplished ahead of the Guangzhou motor show that took place from 20-22 November, 2015.
Designed by artist Steve Messam, the construction of the bridge began with the assembly of a pair of specially designed wooden abutments, as per a 3000-year-old technique. Paper sheets were then stacked on these supports using temporary framework to hold them in place without the use of any kind of adhesive. Once this was complete, the framework was removed, resulting in a 3.4-metre-high and five-metre-long free-standing paper arch.
In charge of the drive was off-road driving instructor, Chris Zhou, who took a nearly 2.7-tonne Range Rover Vogue powered by a supercharged V6 across the paper bridge. After accomplishing the feat, the sustainably sourced paper was repurposed by Land Rover with the remainder recycled locally for reuse in China.