Cool Collector # Art Files

Now this is what you can call a conceptual Christmas tree. This 33-foot tall holiday tree build of 86 shopping carts is a creation of Anthony Schmitt. It’s standing in the Edgemar mall in Santa Monica, California. I love it, beats the boring trees we usually see in malls.

“The shopping cart tree symbolizes both generosity and abundance, as well as acknowledging those less fortunate where their whole world may be housed in a cart. We see shopping carts every day and take them for granted. Individually the beauty of an everyday object may become invisible, but in quantity you can’t miss it,” says Anthony Schmitt of his design.

This actually isn’t the first year that the shopping cart tree has gone up – Schmitt conceived the idea 14 years ago at the request of Abby Sher, the former owner and developer of Edgemar, and the Colwell and Belden families have continued the annual tradition of commissioning the tree since buying Edgemar in 2007.

The 2010 tree is made out of mostly full size carts with some smaller versions at the top to create a forced perspective of height. The carts are supported by an internal structure that remains nearly invisible, allowing the carts to seem like they were merely stacked atop one another and left in that perilous formation.”

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