The Resources Project

*In Design and Engineering we came up with ideas on how to save our resources. We did research on how many things we use a day, and how much natural resources we use a day and yearly. The resources people use on the daily bases are from tissue paper, to plastic bags. From Starbucks coffee cups, to take-out tupper ware. My partner and I chose to give a prime example on a resource people use everyday. We chose tissue paper. We chose this specific resource because people use it everyday and needs it for almost everything. Our project is a Tissue Paper Forest. We used just as much tissue paper on this project as somebody would in a months worth (1,440). Enjoy.

 

                                                  DS, (October 2013). Tissue Forest

The purpose of this project was to take an item that is used on an everyday basis, see how much is accumulated in trash, and put that item into a relatable and impacting visual representation to try to show people how much they're really wasting. Our desired outcome will be to influence people into wasting less out of this awareness. 

Within this unit I realized that I produced more trash every day than I'd ever thought. I learned that trash is accumulates and the small details in habit make a big difference in the long run. Seeing the flaws in these number systems allowed me to develop gratitude for our current number system. One of the things I was most proud of was coming up with a project idea with my partner; something that looks good and is presentable. 

Back to the project. The installation itself is made of cardboard tubes from used toilet paper rolls, scattered toilet paper sheets, and an entire roll in the center. We wanted every piece of material to represent something. For example, the cardboard tubes are cut into little trees, representing the forests that suffer from the production of toilet paper. There are 20 sheets of toilet paper under the forest to represent the average use of tissue paper the average person uses in a day, and there's a large roll of toilet paper in the center to represent a month's worth of tissue paper. By doing this, we hoped to show people that they may not realize how much they're using up by just looking at a compact roll of toilet paper (the roll in the center). When as little as a day's worth is all spread out (the sheets underneath the trees), it shows that to be much more paper waste than expected. 

This project took my partner and I at least two days to come up with. Hopefully it will impact the people it reaches to be more mindful of how much paper they really need when using the bathroom. This is important because in one year approximately two billion rolls of tissue paper are used world-wide. In one day, a person uses about 20 sheets of toilet paper , 4 people use 80 sheets, and 16 people use 320 sheets.

         The Wall Street Journal, (January 2010). The Paper Chase