Our oceans are filled with plastic waste that will never fully decompose – the pieces just get smaller and smaller, and therefore more difficult to collect. Seeking to address this pervasive problem, Britain-based Studio Swine worked with Kieren Jones to create the Sea Chair – a sturdy stool made of recycled plastic waste collected from the ocean!
The plastic used in Studio Swine’s Sea Chairs is harvested from the UK’s most polluted beach, Porthtowan – a small blustery cove on the southwest extremity of the British Isles. The studio collects tiny plastic pellets with a low-tech device they created from refurbished agricultural machinery found at salvage yards. This device, dubbed ‘The Nurdler’ consists of a hand-powered water pump, a sluice that sorts plastic micro nodules by size, and a floatation tank that separates materials by density.
Studio Swine creates their recycled plastic seats using a device they call the Sea Press – a furnace and hydraulic press that fits on a small fishing vessel. The studio also collects organic materials such as seaweed and wood and compresses them to make bricks, which they then burn to melt the plastic – that’s what we call a closed loop system!
+ Studio Swine
Photo © Studio Swine
Via This is Paper
