 |
| Image From www.amazon.com |
This week's reading is a compilation of essays all discussing plastics in the new era. The first essay treats plastic as a sort of magical innovation of man. It can be used to create a myriad of objects and is an entirely man made, manufactured product. However, it does suggest that even though it is a wondrous material, it is also a cheap material, falling somewhere under the marginal section on the hierarchal list of design materials. The article suggest plastic's unnatural origin is its undoing, from the artificial colors it can hold, to the sound it makes when struck, plastic is a cheap imitation product. In fact, the author of the essay states that plastic, "...is the first magical substance which consents to be prosaic. But it is precisely this prosaic character is a triumphant reason for its existence: for the first time artifice aims at something common not rare." The author finishes the essay by basically stating that for every natural substance there is a plastic alternative and that new items can be created because plastic exists, and not the other way around, as is the case with natural materials.
This essay is really interesting because it brings up the issue of the established value system certain materials receive. Such as real versus the fake (and albeit usually plastic) alternative and why the real is more highly prized than the imitation. This idea is especially interesting when applied to interior design, as in who assigns this value system. Is engineered wood so much worse than natural wood flooring? If the value system designers used was strictly a numbers game than plastics would win most of the time as it is a less expensive material. But designers and their designed spaces don't work on a purely value engineered scale. They work on an artistic scale, and in that scale I think originality of design is highly coveted. Thus real walnut is coveted over walnut laminate. But, I do think there are some modern plastic alternatives that offer original design, and thus are not inexpensive, in fact they are very expensive. Case in point being the line of plastic chairs from Kartell, known as the Ghost Chairs. The starting price for this chair line begins at $375.00 for a single plastic (polycarbonate) chair (see below).
 |
| Image From www.neimanmarcus.com |
About a year ago I decided I was going to buy one of these chairs, to my dismay I found out the price and went stomping into my local Design Within Reach store to ask them how on earth a plastic chair could cost that much money. The response I received did seem to justify the price. They said the entire chair is a product of a single mold injection of polycarbonate. Meaning that the chair did not have a single joint, it was one solid, fluid piece of plastic. The fact that the chair is without any joints only adds to the durability of the chair (I know plastic and durable seems like an oxymoron), because the chair can withstand up to 450 pounds of pressure in any direction without breaking or cracking. Here Kartell has reinvented a classic chair silhouette with a modern material, plastic, and they figured out how to make it durable. Thus Kartell seems to be in striking contrast with the first essay's author.
The second essay in the reading suggest that the tug of war created between the natural and artificial and their respective value systems is simply a moral dilemma. The author suggests that the materials are simply and objectively the materials, and one should/is not more highly valued than the other. He suggests that in plastic designers have the ability to further abstract materials, and that abstraction transcends the argument between natural and synthetic and ends with the conclusion that they are all just building materials. Keep in mind that my review of this article is a gross over simplification, but the appearance of the essay in the reading does seem to answer (at least partially) the paradox proposed in the first essay, thus offering a small resolution.
No comments:
Post a Comment