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A Parrot for Flaubert neckpiece

  "A parrot for Flaubert neckpiece" is a necklace made in 2012, designed and made by Kevin Coats, now it is placed in the jewelry room in the V&A museum. To make a tribute to the parrot named Loulou in “A Simple Heart,” designer Kevin Coates made this necklace. About how the necklace is made and the material, there are four drops of jewelry made of carnelian, emerald, amethyst, and citrine. The necklace part is assembled by vivid rainbow color gemstones.

   Moreover, parrot Loulou’s body is made of gold and painted silver, the parrot's eye is made by cabochon sapphire, the beak is made by carved black mother-of-pearl, the luminous abstract left-wing is a piece of ancient iridescent glass, the background is an old page from “A Simple Heart”. The necklace part is arranged by rainbow gemstones with four jewel drops, the parrot right-wing is painted of the gradation of the rainbow necklace. A Parrot for Flaubert neckpiece is not a necklace for wearing, it more tends to be like a collection. Additionally, this necklace is for Kevin Coates’ “A bestiary of jewel” series instead of sell, every people had ever read the short novel "A simple heart" will know who the parrot is, this is an advertisement. As it is an artifact rather than a product on the assembly line, it does not change market dynamics.

  The inspiration for this necklace is from Parrot Loulou in a novel written by Gustave Flaubert called” A simple heart”. Parrot Loulou is a symbol of the main character Félicité ’s sincere and odd religion to her Catholic faith. After Madame Aubain, a rich woman in this novel inherited the parrot from her dead friend, she found this parrot was annoyed, so she gave the parrot to Félicité. Because of her generous humble personality of Christian traits, Félicité treated the parrot nicely when she looked after it. After the parrot died, she stuffed Loulou and prayed to it every morning as Christians prayed to white pigeons. Furthermore, this fragment also is an irony for the French bourgeoisie’s fake faith from author Flaubert. The French bourgeoisie claimed they are Christians, but they did not have great personalities.

  V&A museum opened in 185, it collected various uncountable collections in unique designs and from different ages. Design is a vital discipline for those collections; thus, every collection has a unique meaning and different looking. And design gave them uniqueness.

  The parrot necklace is placed next to an exaggerated style necklace with bird egg size glass. They are placed in an area for jewels and necklaces. The introduction text of the parrot necklace tells visitors who designed and made the necklace, and where the inspiration is from. Due to it being a modern artifact, it includes very less historical messages, but it connects to a novel in a previous period. Designer Kevin Coates turns his imagination into reality, he makes an amazing-looking jewel necklace and puts an animal bestiary story in his design.

Reference list:

LitCharts. 2022. Loulou the Parrot Symbol in A Simple Heart | LitCharts. [online] Available at: <https://www.litcharts.com/lit/a-simple-heart/symbols/loulou-the-parrot> [Accessed 27 February 2022].

Katerina Perez. 2022. Katerina Perez | Kevin Coates’ A Bestiary of Jewels’ at the Ashmolean Museum. [online] Available at: <https://www.katerinaperez.com/articles/kevin-coates-a-bestiary-of-jewels-at-the-ashmolean-museum> [Accessed 27 February 2022].

Museum, V., 2022. A Parrot for Flaubert | Kevin Coates | V&A Explore The Collections. [online] Victoria and Albert Museum: Explore the Collections. Available at: <https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1374536/a-parrot-for-flaubert-neckpiece-in-wall-kevin-coates/> [Accessed 27 February 2022].

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Observing the everyday

                                               straw

   Straw is a kind of item commonly use in people’s daily life, especially when people need to have a drink outside. According to government figures, there are 8.5 billion straws were estimated every year in Britain, this is a quite huge number. As straw is a kind of practical daily use in our life, there are various types of straws for different drinks and use.

     Paper straw is the straw people and beverage shops commonly use in recent years, due to so much plastic trash produces using plastic straws, the materials made straw had been changed from plastic to paper, for instance, if anyone buy a cup of coke in McDonalds’, he will get a paper straw instead of a plastic straw. The reason that an immense change occurs on material made straw is recycling, plastic is nondegradable, therefore, after people use plastic straws and straws become trash, those trash are hard to deal with; but paper is easier to deal with compared to plastic, it is benign and recyclable for environment at all. Meanwhile, they are foundationally different in their practically. Due to the material, the paper straw is usually straight, because the material of paper is easy to soften after contacting the liquid. If it is made into a straw with elbow, it will speed up its softening speed and shorten the tasting period of the beverage. In contrast, the plastic straw will not soften with the time of contact with the beverage, and can better maintain the taste. However, as I said earlier, it is not beneficial for environment, the extensive use of plastic straw causes a great burden on the environment.

   In addition, except plastic straws and paper straws, metal straws are becoming common in recent years. Consumers can find them on the shelves of any large supermarket chain. Unlike plastic and paper disposable straws, metal straws can be used multiple times, besides to the special case, metal straws are rarely used when eating out. When eating out, we can use the metal tableware provided by restaurants without psychological burden. Even if the principle is the same, it is rarely heard that some restaurants use metal straws as tableware. Whether the straws are made of paper or plastic, most restaurants only provide disposable straws. Metal straws are also not easy to clean. It is necessary to ensure that the interior is cleaned after each use. Unlike other cutlery, for example plates and spoons, they can be used next time by cleaning their surfaces. If they are not personal metal straws but in restaurants, I think it is difficult to do this. This is the limitation of metal straws I observed.

   For a result, straw as a daily-use item have different material and as it material changed the effect and the function of straw will be changed as well. Designers need to think about that how to make the use of straw become more convenient.

  Reference list:

 Full Fact, 2019. How many plastic straws do we use? Full Fact. Available at: https://fullfact.org/environment/how-many-plastic-straws/ [Accessed February 4, 2022].

 Hugh et al., 2021. Paper vs. plastic straws: Is paper really better for the environment? Get Green Now. Available at: https://get-green-now.com/environmental-impact-paper-vs-plastic-straws/ [Accessed February 4, 2022].