Hasta La Ideas

We’ve seen some of Brendan Ravenhill’s work in the past, from a broad survey to a closer look at specific projects as well as a few appearances in our photo galleries circa 2010/2011.

For his latest project, the “Spun Metal Planter,” the Los Angeles-based designer has produced a video about the manufacturing process that imparts the vessel with its distinctive shape and indeed its inspiration.

The trumpet-like shape of this Spun Metal Planter resulted from a manufacturing mistake that happened when we were cutting a metal blank size for a recent wastebasket prototype. The blank was too big, so the spinner ran out of room when forming the lip of the wastebasket and the result was this flared out form—which we loved. The one-off accident became a succulent planter on our porch, and quickly got a lot of interest from visiting friends. At their urging, we did a run of 25 planters and made a short film of the process. If you look at the grain of the aluminum carefully, you can see how spinning the form in the air rather than on the wooden mold results in a completely different finish on the flared neck.

From this…

…to this

The process itself is something like using a lathe as a potter’s wheel, albeit with metal instead of clay. Other applications include a range of axially symmetric objects, from rocket nose cones to candleholders and, of course, wastebaskets.

Learn more about metal spinning on Wikipedia.

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