Challenged by the local water company, Serra da Estrela, Portuguese design firm Colectivo da Rainha was to find a way to re-use the company’s PET plastic bottles as the central material in a new product. Accepting the challenge, the duo created the Plastic Bird House as a way to give a home to birds from something you already have in your home.
The water company takes environmental issues seriously with their campaign to plant a tree for each bottle that’s sold and the designers, Filipa Ricardo and Renato Silva, took that to heart with their own belief that we all have “a home for nature in our home.” Each birdhouse is made from a single water bottle and the handle remains as a perch for the birds.
After experimenting with the bottles and seeing that they could be re-molded and shaped with heat, the material became useful. Best of all, the birdhouses are now being made and sold by a team of once-unemployed artisans as a way of carving their own employment stability in the job market.
Photos courtesy of Colectivo da Rainha.
Alex on 01.02.2013 at 10:22 AM
What a brilliant story!
Dan @ Home Decorating Shop UK on 01.02.2013 at 12:14 PM
A wonderful initiative. Daring and original as an approach to home and garden retail, and also with a good environmental drive behind it.
Not to mention of course that the Bird Houses themselves are very well-formed and aesthetically pleasing.
Brenden on 01.02.2013 at 12:30 PM
It would be awesome if they could have the company reshape their package (the bottle) into this shape so it will never need to be remolded.
The company could have a quick diagram on what to do with bottle once it is consumed.
Of course this would have a positive image for the company. And with the new shape, they might be able to ship them in a smaller foot print…?
Brenden on 01.02.2013 at 12:34 PM
I know separating yourself from the competition is very important. We also know that water that is pure is the same as other water that is pure.
To add to this, we all know that drinking bottled water is also a status thing……
Couple all of this together, and this company could really have a lift in sales if they thought about reshaping the bottle permanently to this new design.
Have a small diagram on the side of the bottle explaining the reason for the shape and how to mount it so it can become a new home for bird.
Perfect