Horn Phone Stand
I have always had both an intense interest in the way people used to live, and a fascination for exploring new and unqiue materials. The revival in cattle horn as a material vitalized this project.
A completely biodegradeable plastic phone stand not made out of plastic.
Horn is a spectacularly underutilized material in the world of design, perhaps for the difficulty involved in mass production. When used properly, however, it offers tantalizingly identical properties to plastic and can easily be mistaken for it. The point of this project was, with two easy steps, create a simple phone stand with completely natural materials, yet will stand the test of time unlike cardboard or other alternatives.
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History
This project focused on rediscovering an ancient material used by cultures all over the world for spoons, cups, bowls, combs, and decoration.
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Once part of a small family of pre-plastic plastic-like materials such as tortoiseshell, horn fell completely out of use by the early 1900s with the introduction of early plastics like bakelite.
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Horn is a thermoforming material which sets as it cools. It is extremely similar to plastic, wile made of completely natural, biodegradable material.
Process
The creation process was an intense learning experience reliant on product archaeology and analysis of former building techniques with the help of antiques website photo galleries.
Photoshop mockups
Thermoforming Process
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I gathered all the materials and safety items I needed on the workbench.
I carefully heat the oil at 325 - 400 degrees F, below the smoke point.
After dunking the horn, I used an improvised form to press the phone rest into shape
I used an improvised wooden dowel as the form for the curve, selected for its radius.
After a thorough degreasing to remove the oil, the phone stand is complete.
