describes the complexity of a bottle molded in PET (polyethylene terephthalate), a kind of packaging that appeared in the late 1960’s and is now everywhere in western society — “a bottle made of several layers of different types of plastic, each with its own different function...[and] blow-molded forms a sandwich of polypropylene ethyl- enevinyl (PP/EVOH/PP) [which] has many of the properties of the PET bottle ...but is squeezable as well. Five layers of this multi-layer extrusion - a kind of polymer lasagna - (PP/EVOH/PP/EVOH/PP) produces a high- barrier plastic [...] ‘shelf stable’ at room temperature, and later put in a microwave oven.” 7 The ultimate test of plastics as a material for dwelling environments may be determined by problems related to off-gassing and users who have developed human allergies and sensitivities.These problems have mushroomed in recent years, particularly in reaction to harsh adhesives and to carpet materials. Greenpeace has prepared a critique of polyvinyl- chloride based on the industrial production of the substance 8 , and recommending alternative materials, synthetic as well as natural. Reassessing Homes Can a dwelling with a life-cycle and a depreciation time be a home? Cedric Price has asserted that,“The ages of a building are five: use, re-use, mis-use, dis-use, and ref-use”, and asked, like Buckminster Fuller, how much the building weighs 9 . Miniaturized commodities - the note- pad, fax, walkman, cellular phone, miniature generators and photovoltaic cells, ushered in a fluid attitude towards territory. Information is condensed into tiny packages; a lifetime of medical record fits on a credit card. With access to transmission through centre-less web systems like the Internet, the daydreams of a perpetually ramblin’ individual, seem realistic and convenient. Webb’s Cushicle seems a logical extension of the relentless commodification invading everyday life, including dwelling 10 .
right: Wearable Environments. Marie-Paule Macdonald, Mobile Inhabitable Cell, model, 1995. Transparent mobile inhabitable cell with magnifying lenses.The top of the cell is shaded by a reflector- mirror equipped with photovoltaics as energy source. Inspired by the ‘messy space station’ of Lem and Tarkovsky’s Solaris, the bottom and some sides of the cell are fitted with magnifying lenses set in the wall membrane.The lenses distort visual perception to allow privacy to the inhabitant. From the inside, the occupant can see flora and fauna such as insects, flowers, bees and hummingbirds hovering outside, magnified to marvelous new scales that reveal rich detail. the cell is meant to be suspended by a simple pulley and cable system so as to rest lightly in a natural environment such as a forest, or in a field, from light structural frame. It could also be hung off existing infrastructure in leftover or underused urban and suburban spaces. Ideally because it does not touch the ground, it would not be classed as ‘real estate’ and no ground rent need be paid.The cell would be energy autonomous and would come equipped with innovative rain water-collection and waste reduction apparatus. Its materials are translucid and transparent synthetics built up in multiple layers. acknowledgements: canada council assistant: magda wojtyra above: Marie-Paule Macdonald, movable inhabitable cell, Khyber Art Centre
6 Sylvia Katz, Plastics in the ‘80s, in The Plastics Age . London:Victoria & Albert Museum, 1990, p 145 7 Katz, p 146-7 8 Greenpeace. PVC:Toxic Waste in Disguise. 1992 9 Cedric Price, ‘Homes and Houses’, AA Files 19 . 1987, p 30 10 Peter Cook, et. al., Archigram . London: Studio Vista 1972 Boston: Birkhauser Verlag 1991.
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