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Heat Shrink Joinery

By Lisa Smith - June 25, 2010

in Object Culture | Events

Nicola Zocca's brilliant heat-shrink joinery was one of our favorites from the Design Products section of the Royal College of Art final show, which opened last night in London (a must-see). The series is appropriately titled "Shrink." The idea is wonderfully simple, and the execution precise and imaginative. Nicola describes it best: "So, just using hot air, it's possible to build and fix chairs, bookshelves and tables."

Of course it's not so simple: serious thought has gone into the forces at play in the furniture, with stainless steel surfaces bent to meet exactly milled notches in the wood, providing the necessary forces to stabilize the colorful joints. Below, see a few tests from Nicola's process, on display at the RCA exhibit.

Lots more great work at the RCA Show 2. Go see it at the Kensington campus through July 4th, 2010.

More shots after the jump.

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Peter Danko

14 years ago

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I love it. Too few designers are simply stylists or can't move their brain beyond the status quo.
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eileen rachman

14 years ago

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creative
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Kevin Granade

14 years ago

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Perhaps it will come full circle, historically many cultures used rawhide for it's "shrink-wrap" properties. I think wicker furniture construction ends up looking somewhat like this.
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Shalin

14 years ago

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I wonder...........I reeeeaally wonder if this indicates that shrink wrap will be the new duct-tape... Could it really be!?
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