In my country, Scotch® has sadly become a generic name for adhesive tape.

Meaning, when I learned to talk and designate objects with words, the only word I had for adhesive tape was 'scotch': 'I wish to make a gift wrap for this, where is the scotch?'

Also the only kind of 'scotch' that I was ever aware of being used by normal people was either clear, translucent, or brown for heavy-duty, and seemed made of plastic, smelled a particular smell, and you needed a blade to cut it, mostly under the form of a 'scotch holder', itself made of plastic (my parents owned a heavy one - the master scotch holder - which was filled with sand and sounded like the sea when you tilted it. But I digress.)

Then at the ripe old age of twenty-nine I happened to walk into a U-Haul store to get moving boxes.
And discovered paper tape.

It sounds like a small thing. But you wouldn't believe the epiphany that this was.
Paper tape is strong.
Paper tape can be cut with only your fingers.
Paper tape does not make a horrible screech when pulled out of the roll.
Paper tape is friendly to the touch.
Paper tape seems made of simpler, less polluting materials than clear tape

[from what I gather, clear tape can be made of plastic film or cellophane - the latter being 100% biodegradable but involving a polluting production process. I want to read this article about the chemistry of adhesive tape. Not sure how the adhesive itself fares environmentally, need more research]

Also I was angry at having to accept that a company had managed to monopolize the very definition of what an object was/should be - up to its name, and successfully pushed its materiality onto my life without my being aware of it.

How many more ingrained habits do I have, that were created by a company to sell goods?

Oh, and the ever important question: do I even really need to use tape, any kind of tape, in my life, or could I just do away with it?

furniture

Inbuilt furniture at Enfield Shaker village, New Hampshire

original photo by Walter Parenteau

Back to moving.

More and more I find the idea of carrying furniture around close to insane.
If you strip down pieces of furniture to absolutely vital ones: namely, perhaps your bed and some storage - do we really need to own them? At the scale of a city, does it make sense to be moving around thousands of similar looking bed frames, wardrobes, and bookshelves, like a huge swaping game which in the end consumes gas, human energy, and leads to the familiar left-behind casualties on the curbside?

Recently I've been mulling over possible alternatives. Among the first solutions: inbuilt furniture. One where architects and designers would participate in taking the load off the inhabitant's back, by making it a necessity to provide inbuilt storage.

The 'student dorm' model, improved. Of course it means accepting the idea of sharing furniture over time, but that's what we already do with buildings. A little clean up, and it's back on tracks for a new life. Wouldn't it be a fine system, where in theory you would only have to bring in your 'soft material' - linens, clothes, books, etc.?


Precedent:

SHAKER INBUILT FURNITURE 

A wonderful example of integrating furniture into the design of buildings. Among the most graceful features of this practice: 'The drawers graduate in height from top to bottom, a typical Shaker design feature that combines practicality with pleasing proportions - the larger drawers are a the bottom so that heavier contents are not precariously near the top.'

Storage cabinet in Hancock Shaker village, Massachusetts
photog by Daveybot

Another thrilling highlight: 'cleanliness - no dust could collect on top or underneath'.


Both quotes are from the wonderful book 'Shaker: Life, Work and Art' by June Sprigg and David Larkin, with photographs by Michael Freeman.

less stuff, more happiness

A TED talk by Graham Hill.

Got lots of things to say about it - good and bad -, will publish soon.

Am investigating his LifeEdited website as well, will be back with thoughts.

+

UPDATE

Opening remark: TED’s 6 minute talks are so frustratingly short they border on the ridicule – speakers can blurt out any kind of nonsense they want, and run away without having to elaborate. But they are also cool because they plant just enough of an idea in your head to start you thinking.

Criticism: I agree with the general intent of that talk (encouraging people to live with less things in less space), but its interpretation / implementation by GH leaves me more than perplexed.

How can you with a straight face tell people to ‘edit ruthlessly’,
then describe the brief for your ‘small’ 420 sq ft apartment as: ‘I wanted it all: home office; sit-down dinner for ten; room for guests; and all my kite-surfing gear. ’
Dude. What the heck did you edit out of your Soho yuppy lifestyle? The talking oven?
‘And, of course…my own movie theater’.
Oh, sorry. You were not done.

The final, completely refurbished apartment looks slick and clever, yes. However:

1. It is doing exactly the same thing as the stackable chairs, Russian-doll bowls, and magic digitization that makes ‘everything disappear’: finding a clean way to cram a lot of stuff into less space, i.e., the opposite of editing.
2. The big elephant in the room is the nasty question which designers do not want to hear: is it relevant today, especially within the framework of a ‘green’ discourse, to even think of designing anything from scratch?
As Christopher Guignon once said: 'sustainability must redefine itself as a tool for dynamic transition, not a tool for sustaining an existing modus operandi.' 

Which is exactly what GH doesn’t seem to have the guts to do.

The entire experience of the LifeEdited contest, while very interesting in terms of space optimization, seems to offer, as the main final deliverable, the design of a highly-customized apartment to sustain the lifestyle of a wealthy New Yorker, while easing up his environmental guilt through some ‘green’ patches.

To me some important questions haven’t surfaced: what does ‘simple life’ mean when societal pressure requires most of us to be connected through technological devices which we must more or less own? Do we really need to each have a fully equipped kitchen? What are daily utilities we could start sharing? Aren’t good plumbing and safe, natural materials more important than home-theaters? How can we be effectively coherent between what we preach and what we do?

mattresses

After my move I had to get rid of one western-style mattress.

Aside from being one of the most difficult things to transport - large, heavy to carry and you never know where to grab them -, trying recycling one and you're in for a treat:

1. mattress manufacturers want to have absolutely no business taking them back for the raw materials (I called)
2. most people are paranoid about bed bugs (understandable)
3. most people are uncomfortable with using another person's old mattress (probably the most personal piece of 'furniture')
4. it is illegal to sell a used mattress in the state I live in (bye bye Craigslist)
5. places such as the Salvation Army or Goodwill very rarely accept them
6. shelters for the homeless welcome mainly single / double size, but not bigger

Therefore, a very likely ending is this one:

So the question is: WHY?
Why do we keep making > selling > using > discarding such inconvenient objects, with a lifecycle which doesn't loop?

Ok, mattresses are, technically, among the awesomest inventions to put on bed frames, and do whatever you use a mattress for. Which makes them very tricky to renounce to.

2 ideas I've been mulling over recently:
- BYE BYE KING AND QUEEN!
Replace the solid king and queen sizes with two halves that can be strapped together with a clever device. That way when you move, you only transport 50% of that inconvenience at the time. Also, the two halves of a couple could each have the firmness they enjoy - say goodbye to compromise!(and couples therapy bills)
- HELLO JAPANESE FUTON:
'the traditional style of Japanese bedding consisting of padded mattresses and quilts pliable enough to be folded and stored away'. Heavenly for transporting.

Folded shikibutons and kakebutons - photo by renfield

From personal experience - sleeping for three months on a futon on a wooden floor - the comfort level is pretty high. Not as bouncy as a spring mattress of course, but cushy enough. You do feel the straightness of the floor below you, but nicely buffered, and maybe even good for your back.

Futons in action - photo by Debs

Sleep tight.

Moving

If, like me, you live in a western(ized) society, leading a nomadic life (i.e. moves every 1,2,3 years) yet having a sedentary lifestyle (i.e. owning a queen size bed frame), moving is an extremely stressful time in your life.

It's probably the only time when you are forced to really face how much s... you have.

I recently moved for the 13th time.

Every time I think to myself: next time you will be lighter.
Slowly getting there, but even when being uber-careful about the things I agree to own, every time I am surprised by the amount.

This is my dream: Travel lightly. Live lightly. Bring with yourself only the necessary.