Explorations in Pine Resin is a research project, aiming to investigate and promote the use of pine resin as a material. Exploring how the substance – which is secreted by pine, fir and cedar trees to heal damage to their bark – can be harvested. Which additional materials can be added to change its properties, what processes it can be shaped with, and ultimately if its renewable and sustainable nature can help respond to the environmental crisis we face today.
Realised as a series of objects, each tries to demonstrate one or more of the materials characteristics. Handles for drawers and tools, showcase how the surface tackiness is a good source of additional grip. Fruit bowls utilise its resistance to bacteria and microbes, and the wide range of vessels demonstrate how resin can make almost any material – paper, card and mesh included – completely watertight.
This is important not just from a creative perspective, with the material enabling the creation of new working methods, but an ecological one too. Pine resin is renewable, carbon negative, biodegradable and infinitely remouldable, and its extraction doesn’t cause any lasting damage to the tree.