Having recently visited ASUS HQ in Taiwan, I couldn’t help but wonder why there is a cow statue in the building lobby covered in motherboards. Take a look for yourself:
Fortunately, I was able to get in touch with creators and designers of this peculiar statue, Martin Huang and Aken Ke, to unravel the story.
It turns out the motherboard cow was conceived during the 65th CowParade in Taiwan. The CowParade is one of the largest and most successful public art events in the world, and has occurred in over 50 cities worldwide since 1999. Artists showcase their talent by covering cow statues with elaborate designs ranging from flowers to…well, motherboards. After the art show, the cow statues are auctioned off, and a large portion of the proceeds go toward worldwide charitable organizations. In fact, more than $20 million have been raised since this event began.
The ASUS designers were inspired by what ASUS does best, which is motherboard. They named this cow statue “2357” because it is covered with 2,357 pieces of motherboard components. 2357 is also ASUS’ code in the Taiwan Stock Exchange. Let’s take a look at the design team in action:
In the end, ASUS donated NT$500,000 to worldwide charitable organizations through the CowParade, and the “2357” motherboard cow now sits proudly in the ASUS HQ lobby gazing over the front entrance. In addition to supporting a great cause, the ASUS designers wanted to showcase their design creativity and challenge themselves outside of just creating electronics.
Awesome!
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