Studio Swine's stunning objects from 1000 nautical miles worth of sea plastic

Date
28 July 2015

Sustainability can get a bit of a bad rap, but Studio Swine are one of many outfits showing that connotations of hemp trousers and the like are daft and outdated. The duo – who scrubbed up very well indeed in our Winter edition of Printed Pages – has recently added yet another string to their sustainable-but-beautiful bow in the form of these sumptuous Gyrecraft pieces. The decidedly opulent looking works were created thanks to an arduous 1000 nautical mile journey across the seas, which saw a crew using a “Solar Extruder” to draw plastic from the waters. The device works by harnessing sunlight to melt and extrude plastic from the sea, and these little fragments were then used to create five gorgeous objets d’art, one representing each of the five major ocean gyres.

“In the swirling gyre, most of the plastics have broken down into tiny fragments which are spread over massive stretches of the ocean,” Studio Swine explains. “Due to their size, they are incredibly difficult to recover in any large quantity making this once disposable material very precious.”

Above

Studio Swine: South Pacific Gyre, 2015

Above

Studio Swine: North Pacific Gyre, 2015

Above

Studio Swine: Indian Ocean Gyre, 2015

Above

Studio Swine: South Atlantic Gyre, 2015

Above

Studio Swine: South Atlantic Gyre, 2015 (detail)

Above
Studio Swine: South Pacific Gyre, 2015
Above

Studio Swine: Indian Ocean Gyre, 2015

Share Article

About the Author

Emily Gosling

Emily joined It’s Nice That as Online Editor in the summer of 2014 after four years at Design Week. She is particularly interested in graphic design, branding and music. After working It's Nice That as both Online Editor and Deputy Editor, Emily left the company in 2016.

It's Nice That Newsletters

Fancy a bit of It's Nice That in your inbox? Sign up to our newsletters and we'll keep you in the loop with everything good going on in the creative world.