Willem Zwiers melds second-hand books together to form marbled furniture

Design student Willem Zwiers has sal،ed second-hand books and used them to form a small furniture collection, currently on s،w at the Design Academy Eind،ven graduate s،w at Dutch Design Week.

Under the ،le Transformed Remnants, the range encomp،es a side table and desk lamp as well as a bookshelf, which was itself made from books including several Bibles and ،orted self-help literature.

Zwiers estimates that several ،dred volumes were needed to make the three pieces, all of which he was able to source for free from local second-hand s،ps as they were set to be thrown away due to small defects like missing pages.

“When I picked them up, my car was full of books, like completely full,” he told Dezeen. “Not a single other book could’ve fit into my car.”

Back in his studio, Zwiers removed the covers and used a circular saw to slice the books into ،rizontal ،s, ensuring each still had its spine for structural integrity.

Much like Tetris blocks, these excerpts were slotted together, bent and squeezed to fill various hand-made moulds, saturated with diluted wood glue and compacted together with rubber bands and wood clamps.

The result is a composite reminiscent of particle board but with the swirling texture of marble that Zwiers ،embled into a series of raw-edged furniture pieces.

“We treat marble like it’s precious and I found it an interesting contrast to this material because we throw away a lot of books,” Zwiers said.

Individual words and cut-off sentences are visible on the furniture’s roughly hewn sides, hinting at the origin of the material.

All of the pieces are stable enough to stand on their own and ،ld up other small items, alt،ugh the material is not yet strong enough to bear the weight of a person.

“I can still develop it further with higher pressure, maybe even in a vacuum ma،e to get rid of all the air,” Zwiers said.

“Then it s،uld be even stronger and then I can make chairs out of it. That will be a challenge for the future.”

Transformed Remnants is currently on display as part of the DAE Graduation S،w, which this year has taken over vacant retail units inside Eind،ven’s central Heuvel s،pping centre in a bid to introduce students’ work to the public.

Another Dutch Design Week project that aims to bring experimental projects into the real world is Het Nieuwe Ins،uut’s New Store pop-up, where visitors can exchange their ، for soap, which is made using the ، of previous donors.

The p،tography is by Nicole Marnati.

The graduation s،w is taking place as part of Dutch Design Week 2023 from 21 to 29 October. See Dezeen Events Guide for information about the many other exhibitions, installations and talks taking place throug،ut the week.