Dutch designer Pepe Heykoop has made a series of furniture by casting recycled tin around wooden offcuts.
Called Bits of Wood, the stools and table use offcuts from a saw mill and tin from the local recycling facilities.
The pieces are packed tightly then fused together with the molten tin, so that the ends of the scrap become part of the seat or table top.
Reuse is a key theme in Heykoop's work, with previous projects incorporating scrap leather and fabric skins for worn-out furniture.
See all our stories about his work here.
Photography is by Annemarijne Bax.
Here are some more details from Heykoop:
There is lots of beauty in materials. We, as a consuming species, are creating an enormous amount of waste in all types of production processes. ‘Bits of Wood’ is a reaction upon handling these leftovers. Pieces of wood this time, leftovers from the sawmill. All the different pieces are modified to fit in a mould where molten tin embraces them and holds them together. The tin comes from a metal recycling department where old tin pots and plates are collected. Collecting these materials can be done locally.
No glue or any screw is used in the process. It is all about the quality of shape and material.
From waste to wonder.
I like it! It reminds me of the pieces done with joints of injected urethane mated to the broken ends of wood members.
isn't tin full of lead, e.g. poisonous?
no it isn't! periodic table Sn. It was sometimes use in combination with lead.
Tin is an element, and is safe. The bright metal coating on the inside of some food cans is tin. You see it used most often with acidic foods like tomatoes or pineapple. Old pewter contains a lot of lead, modern pewter is about 90% tin. Tin is also about ten times as expensive as lead.