thebananapeelproject - Tumblr blog

[thebananapeelproject]

Photo by Ashley Rose Tacheira

[thebananapeelproject]

Photo by Chelsea McAlexander

[thebananapeelproject]

Photo by Chelsea McAlexander

[thebananapeelproject]

After the fact (as usual when experimenting on a project), I realized that I should attempt to glue the skin to the mesh before attaching all the pieces together. As I have been attempting to try some glues to keep the skin to the mesh, I realized that it is so very challenging to keep the skin smooth along something with so many contours. My next plan is to use some of the scrap mesh I have and just run some glue tests. I’m looking for an adhesive which is inexpensive, strong, and will allow for flexibility.

The guy who helped me at Douglas and Sturgess mentioned that the rubber I plan to use will pretty much stick to anything. I may attempt to skip the adhesive and see if I can apply the rubber compound directly over the mesh which would have the skin underneath. More work, more experiments, more fun.

[thebananapeelproject]

The Bananas is a garage band from Sacramento, California which is where I grew up. Though I didn’t know about The Bananas until I was in my early 20s, they are still an amazing band.

[thebananapeelproject]

[thebananapeelproject]

A few weeks ago, I went to one of my favorite places in San Francisco for materials – Douglas and Sturgess. I first learned about D&S from Noel as we worked on various aspects of The Secret Alley. Noel knew about the shop because it’s the best place to get materials for making masks, makeup prosthetics, and mold making.

Originally I thought about using latex for the inside of the banana peel. I took my time handling all the samples on display next to their corresponding kits. I asked a couple questions of the thin, long haired, bearded man behind the counter. He told me that latex doesn’t last very long, perhaps a year if kept in good conditions. I realized I needed something more durable – I want to keep the peel for as long as possible. I looked around at the available alternatives and decided on rubber. So I purchased the Smooth-On Brush-On® 40 2-pint kit. If all goes well, I will most likely purchase one or two of the gallon kits for the final peel.

Last night, I printed another copy of my peel pattern. I used it to cut some vinyl to shape. I will be using some fabric glue to apply these skins to the wire mesh frame I already made. Unfortunately, the glue is in a package I had delivered to my work so I won’t be able to move forward on this until later. My plan is to get the skins glued and hopefully apply the 2-part rubber either today or Wednesday.

[thebananapeelproject]

Photo by Cody Frost

[thebananapeelproject]

Photo by Nicole Atkin

[thebananapeelproject]

Photo by Chelsea McAlexander

[thebananapeelproject]

Some time back in 2010, I had a very silly idea pop into my head one day: what would happen if someone made a 2-story tall banana peel and, some time during a quiet night, just left it in the middle of a city intersection? So much absurd mayhem, so many people would be disrupted by such a ridiculous object, confronted but its immense banality while being unable to easily remove it from the public’s path.

To build such a thing was just a dream, and as I was often of modest means (even now), had no way of building something so monumental. Yet I thought about the idea a bit more and more over the next few weeks. I asked myself, if I scale the idea down a bit, might I be able to possibly make many larger-than-life banana peels?

These are some photos I took while doing some light experimentation. The hands in the photo are those of my then girlfriend, who was excitedly helping me try to make this banana peel project come to fruition.

[thebananapeelproject]

Photo by Chelsea McAlexander

[thebananapeelproject]

Prototyping the banana peel’s framework. This is made out of coated aluminum woven mesh purchased from Blick. The four sides of the peel are ‘stitched’ together with some 26 gauge wire brite.  (I saw my spool had a description, so I did a quick search.) I’ve carried around with my tools for years. I have no idea where it originally came from but most likely it is from my mom’s craft supplies.

The idea is to see how this process works with some of the materials I’ve already collected. Eventually scaling this up, my hope is that a larger woven mesh will allow the peel to be poseable and possibly able to stand upright on its own. My next step is to apply the vinyl outer ‘skin’.

[thebananapeelproject]

The other day I ate a banana.

I also was very purposeful when peeling the skin away. I was able to get these two pieces to attempt to make a pattern. I scanned them into my computer before outlining them in Illustrator. I then did some adjusting and made the straight peel a bit more uniform in shape. I also realized that (though a banana technically has 5 sides) the top and bottom panel of the 4-sided pattern needed to be different lengths - the shortest being on the inside of the curve and the longest on the outside.

[thebananapeelproject]

Research, research, research...

[thebananapeelproject]

[thebananapeelproject]

As I walked along Market Street, through downtown and the Financial District, I discovered this laying in the middle of a crosswalk - completely free, untouched, ripe for the picking. Bananas are everywhere.