Over the last year, we have been studying materials used to produce well-preserved antique gilded furniture made in mainland Europe. These materials and techniques may today seem gruesome or unethical since they involve the use of animal bones and rabbit skin, but the actual final products can be disposed of as nutritious additions to household compost. The recipe tested was “Compo”, a dough like substance widely used on 19th Century French heavily ornamented furniture. A variation of the material was also used in Cypriot frame making.

This project sprung from the hypothesis that if the way we produce today is largely a consequence of the Industrial Revolution, then the re-introduction of pre-industrial techniques into modern systems of manufacture might bear some solutions to the problem of waste and overproduction.

The product chosen to embody this research is a classic architect's drafting lamp as it is a technically intricate icon of industrialised design. We needed to find ways for its basic functions to operate while working with dough.