The island of plastic in our Pacific Ocean is surely confirmation that we need to better engage with our consumption of plastics. A graduate of the RCA’s Design Products programme, James Shaw has created a handheld gun that converts thermoplastics into playful, extravagant furniture.
The plastic-extrusion gun features alongside an arsenal of other weapons that made up Shaw’s graduation show including a papier-mâché and a pewter gun. The plastic-extrusion gun turns the extrusion of polymers, usually an industrial task carried out in distant factories, into a handheld process. Using this process, the designer has launched his ‘Plastic Baroque’ range.
Featured in the Aram Gallery’s 'Future Stars?' exhibition, these pieces capitalise on the fluidity of the technique, Shaw says they 'revel in sensualism.'
At it’s core though, the project is about sustainability. Unlike traditional, subtractive means of production which take away from a raw material to create the finished piece, the guns are additive and as a result leave no waste. The project forms part of a larger movement of recycling focussed design, the most notable example being Dave Hakkens’ Precious Plastics project, which offers a range of plastic machines designed to facilitate recycling on a small scale.