One Good Chair: fruit trees, not plastic
Posted by core77.com's design blog in ARTS, BLOGROLL, CREATIVITY, DESIGN, INTERNET, MEDIA, VISUAL
For yet another example of rising oil prices influencing product design, look no further than the recently-announced results of the One Good Chair design competition, put on by the Sustainable Furniture Council:
…as the price of oil has skyrocketed, suddenly what makes a piece of furniture green is changing. Now, designers must consider how much energy it takes to manufacture a piece of furniture, as well as take into account the amount of fuel it will require to ship a piece of furniture.
…[Winner Jessica] Konawicz, a graduate student pursuing her masters degree in industrial design at North Carolina State University, created a fluid, flowing design made with a mold, similar to mass-produced plastic lawn chairs. The only difference: Konawicz’s chair is made from a material that comes from the fruit and leaves of the Pandamus tree instead of plastic, which is made from petroleum.
Konawicz said the material is similar to fiberglass, but it’s eco-friendly because it’s biodegradable. (Konawicz said rainwater will not harm the chair, but prolonged exposure to sunlight will affect the plant-based material.)
“A lot of chairs I’ve seen have been made out of PVC, and they’ve said it can be made from recycled PVC itself or it can be recycled, but really recycling is a whole other process that is not earth friendly. You have to go through a lot of energy to get it recycled,” Konawicz explained. “With this process… when you’re done with the chair, it biodegrates into the earth. So there’s no waste and it doesn’t harm the earth at all, and I thought that was impressive.”
Click here for the full article.
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