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 Float is the experimental design outcome from a third year “new wood materials” class. A class dedicated to emphasize hands-on exploration of wood matters , alternate production processes or techniques surrounding unconventional wood matters. We had the opportunity to work with reconstituting wine cork stoppers collected locally by the company Cork It. As a practice led research approach, I developed a strong consciousness about cork as a matter and challenges involved in reusing materials collected as bi-product from the consumption cycle rather than harvested from a natural resource.Throughout the project, there was a continuous research into cork as a material paired with an industrious process of experimenting with material transformation through additive and subtractive production methods. In this project the emphasis lay on the process and exploration of materiality.

 

“Float is a tangible design output

that responds to the need to test concepts

of reusing materials collected as bi-product,

rather than as a response to a product need”

 

The cork bottle stoppers are originate typically from the bark of the cork oaks in Portugal. It is a material that is displaced globally as the simple cork stopper. Cork is well suited for reprocessing and reconstitution as its intrinsic chemical compound lignin creates a natural adherence between the cork granules. This natural adherence process is achieved under the right heat and pressure treatment, meaning it does not require other additive substances or adhesive materials that could alter or pollute the cork substance. However the equipment, expertise and efforts in place to agglomerate cork remains quite local to the Portuguese region. There is also the issue of the lack of knowledge of the true material quality of the cork collected as bi-products. Some corks are already agglomerated, some were plastic and some were various grades of “punched” cork bark. It begs to question what kind of products are suited with these material tolerances.

 

/Process

The experimentation process triggered a strong sense of fragmentation of knowledge and processes required to re-use cork. In order to be able to test and prototype in the material, we had to retort to many unconventional and production-wise inefficient methods and techniques in order to grind down the cork stoppers, agglomerate the material and make the final form.

 

/Features

Float is a bath toy that features the buoyant properties of cork material and that poses as an alternative to more harmful synthetic bath toys that children are offered today. My design intention was to play up an inherent property in the cork material, which in this case was its buoyant abilities when in contact with water. I have taken a playful approach, using the semiotics of sea fare and traditional equipment to create a children’s toy that mimics this narrative. Cork buoys, ropes and beacon fluorescent orange equipment supports the  narrative form of this piece.

 

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