Week 8 Response from Joyce

Learn from China

As a country with a huge population, Chinese people have been using different kinds of local materials, including different minerals: iron, nonferrous metals, coal, petroleum, and other chemical elements. Local craft techniques are mainly divided in two aspects, the first one is in the art area, there are painting, silk, paper-cut, embroidery, folk toys, etc, while another is in the industry field, where plastic is more widely used. In electrical and electronic industries, plastics are used as insulating materials instead of wood. In the engineering industry, plastic is a great replication of metals when making gears, bearings and many other parts. In the construction industry for doors and windows, stair railing, floor tile, ceiling, insulation board, downspouts, decorative board, and sanitary ware. In the defense industry, whether conventional weapons, aircraft, ships, rockets, missiles, satellites and other fields, plastic is essential materials that can replicate all kinds of other materials.

Kongming Lantern

Finding References

-Solution 1: Plastic bottles for different design

Since not all the plastic bottles have a chance to be recycled and made into reusable micro pieces, reuse them in life as a long-term thing is a good way. There are different ways of reusing them in our daily lives, such as hanging herb baskets, jewelry towers, bird feeders, zipper case and so on. These designs follow the rules of cyclic mined, also utility since they can be kept for a long time.

-Solution 2: Glass/thick bottles/tires for furniture

Glass bottles or thicker plastic bottles, as well as old tires, can also be turned into parts of your furniture. Easily to be broken outdoors, they can be kept perfectly indoors and work as good-looking decorations in your room, while useful as well. You can even put some plants inside the bottle at the same time. These products follow the cyclic mined rule since the furniture can be recycled for even the second or more times.

-Solution 3: Waste PVC as plant-pot

PVC is a plastic that cannot really be remade since when it is burnt it will release toxic fumes, dioxins, and hazardous chlorine gas. Therefore, use the original PVC pipe without burning or other dangerous processing is the best way to reuse PVC pipes. Since PVC is hard to degrade and is water-proof, its durability and efficiency can be guaranteed using as a plant-pot.