Piet Hein Eek

These three paintings of steel and stainless steel are the latest three pieces created as part of the scrap project. The scrap project was launched in 2000 and was born out of the desire to escape the everyday necessity to work as efficiently as possible. In the race to work as little as possible for as much money as possible, less and less attention is paid to materials and residual materials are often written off as waste. It is cheaper to saw off large numbers of small pieces from one large board than to save small pieces of wood, remember where you put them and then select the usable pieces to make a leg out of. I figured I’d turn the whole thing around instead. Materials are invaluable and work is free. This way, you get to spend as much time as you want. The piece is the result of an endless repetition of actions. Whereas, normally, as little attention as possible would be paid to these materials, the value of these pieces is based 100% on the patience of a saint.

Design of pipe table, chair with armrests, chair and stools

Materials:

Tubes: dismantled from our building Fabric: old awning from the buildings demolished around us. Tabletop: recycled beams

The tube chair is made of old pipes that were salvaged from the building we bought and renovated last year. In spite of the huge number of pipes we discarded, we also managed to save quite a large quantity. The first pipe piece we produced was the pipe bar for the restaurant. This was followed by the design for this armchair, bar chairs, small bar tables and, finally (for now at least), the pipe bench (although we have plenty of other ideas for other objects). The models are numbered consecutively by name (i.e. chair no. 1, bench no. 2, and so on).

The chunky beam bench is part of a series of objects made from enormous old beams. Since there is only a limited stock of these beams, the series is limited. A chunky beam armchair, as well as a number of other objects, is also being produced. The idea is inspired by a large number of beams we purchased a few years back and which we had been at a loss at what to do with ever since. So this back-to-basics design, in all its simplicity, is the result of a rather longprocess of designing, experimenting and producing. The models are numbered consecutively by name (i.e. armchair no. 1, bench no. 2, and so on).