Fitting in. Standing out.

For five years, Jake has been collecting coffee stirrers. Mass, ephemeral, pointless, forgettable stirrers. The idea of the ‘unattainable’ that lies at the very heart of collecting is a frustration for some and a pleasure for others.
Jake’s story begins with frustration…
He gave up collecting stamps when he was seven because he was never going to collect them all. You can get relatively close to attainability when you collect stirrers, especially when you give yourself parameters to work within – so it goes that a stirrer will only end up in Jake’s collection if it is served with a hot drink.
Delicate, fragile, struggling to be someone. Coffee stirrers aren’t really necessary, are they? What exactly do they think they are? Won’t a teaspoon do?
I mean, I’ve never come across a paint tin stirrer nor wanted for one.

An old ruler, wooden spoon or screwdriver will suffice.
Somewhere along the way, stirrers have been deemed worthy, carving out a space for them-selves. It’s a small and some might say, absurd space and understandably so. It’s difficult to find an identity when your reason for existing isn’t clear.
Despite this, the market has derived different aesthetics for coffee stirrers.
In Jake’s collection some are spoon-like or resemble cocktail stirrers; some accept their place in the system of objects; some are scientific and focus on function; some are dramatic and novel and one in particular appears to be a pillar of strength and confidence.
Design is both problem-solving and problem-seeking and a designer seeks out problems in order to find the right design solution.

Thing is, I’m not sure we really have a problem here. Like I said, just use a spoon. The cerebral landscape a designer must explore when considering stirrer design, is the same landscape I explore when I make art.
How is an identity formed? Where does it start and where does it end? What are the forces at work that shape it?
Our own personal histories, cultures and experiences all play a part in the creation of identity, along with a need to classify, order and resolve, making life easier to deal with.
The following photographs showcase a selection of Jake’s stirrers.
He’s collected them from different countries of the world but he can’t remember exactly where each one came from, which I’m not sure really matters…