
A collection of toys made from leather offcuts by Swiss designer Adrien Rovero is on show as part of Passionswege at Vienna Design Week this month.

The Passionswege project pairs young designers with traditional Viennese businesses and stores.

Rovero made the toys, called Skinni, in collaboration with leather manufacturer Thomas Posenanski.

Scrap pieces of leather are cut using a computer-controlled machine, folded into animal shapes and secured with rubber fastenings.

Rovero says the project aims to symbolically turn waste material derived from animals back into animals.

Vienna Design Week continues until 11 October.
Here’s some text from the designer:
–
Skinni
The serie of toys skinni come from the idea to remake animals out of leather skins, as a kind of return in the leather transformation process. These new animals toys are made out pieces of leather folded and assembled by a small caoutchouc parts. The shape of the animals are coming from the materials rather than an figurative approach, this simplicity is an important part of these toys and the folded approach can stimulate imagination.

Another important point is the materials itself. Leather seems to be interesting to feel and touch and, it offer many different tactile feelings and surfaces. Those feelings increase by their structural cuts and holes. They can be manufactured using small pieces of leather and waste.

In few words:
Remake animals with leather skins
Replay with textures and surfaces
Reuse leather waste
Rethink the connections details
Recognise the folded shape
This project has been made for the Vienna Design Week 2009 in Collaboration with Thomas Posenanski leather manufacturer
Edition:
Prototypes
Exhibition :
Passionswege 2009, Vienna
–
Posted by Rose Etherington


October 7th, 2009 at 3:21 pm
Yeah, right. Try giving your kids some of THOSE for Christmas. They’ll hate you forever.
October 7th, 2009 at 3:46 pm
Leather origami. I like. And indeed covet that little elephant. Covet, I say.
October 7th, 2009 at 6:31 pm
cute !
October 7th, 2009 at 10:27 pm
The argentinean guys of Vaca Valiente, does the same, but five years ago.
http://www.vacavaliente.com/
October 8th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
Absolutely adorable toys!
I suspect they will be used more as an executive’s toy set.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:03 pm
Making toy animals out of real animals! Where is the toy cow? I would just get my kids a pet.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:41 pm
Now we are talking.
http://www.theworldsbestever.com/2009/10/08/how-to-mount-an-elephant/
October 8th, 2009 at 5:01 pm
Excellent!
We can help our children to imagine better!
October 8th, 2009 at 8:25 pm
No kids would wanna play with these ‘toys’.
October 9th, 2009 at 1:16 pm
Fantastic! I love them… and I am sure adults will appreciate them more!
But I also like the idea of simple toys for children… like wood toys.
Great!
October 10th, 2009 at 12:56 pm
Congratulatiosn Adrien! Smart and simple. Kids will love it!