Place-settings that look like model-kits
Artist Demelza Hill created this model-car-kit-esque set of fine dining cutlery, intended to reinforce the "correct use of cutlery."
Snap and Dine (via Make)
Snap and Dine is a single use three-course table setting that integrates disposable cutlery with traditional silverware. The portable lunch setting expands the possibilities of eating outdoors in style whilst reinforcing the correct use of cutlery, which has been lost over time. This is achieved through the decorative qualities and formal setting which both are a visual reference to fine dinning. This product is fun and interactive whilst raising the standards of current eating on the go habits.
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I am deeply irritated by the recurring belief that there is a "correct" arrangement for these things, "correct" uses for each item, etc. It offends the very core of my jury-rigging nature. Tools have no "correct" uses, only the uses each person decides for them!
On the other hand, putting a plate and some cutlery on a sprue amuses me on many levels.
I'd love to utilize this nifty little portable place-setting... I think it is just so beautifully and cleverly done.
This is great...except for the single use aspect.
Wow! Those look perfect for the next time I barbecue...at Martha Stewart's house.
Three courses and only one plate? Methinks I see a dining etiquette faux pas.
I was never into plastic model kits. I prefer to make my tableware out of DAS before eating.
Correct use? That would be an interesting goal if the silverware were correctly laid out for three courses. The dessert fork and spoon at top are incorrectly positioned. They should be directly above the plate instead of having the spoon intrude into the position of the wine and water glasses. At least the tines of the fork are pointing the right way.
I can't think of a menu that would call for this placement. Plus, why combine a fish knife and salad fork in the same course?
I saw these at K-Mart last week, in different colors.
Do they come with an Xacto and sandpaper?
Mary Robinette's quite right- the dessert fork has the wrong shape of tines, too.
Of course, this is assuming that you're not following the U/Non-U rules to avoid seeming nouveau riche or vulgar- if you are, fish knives ought never be seen, since they were a late 19th-Century innovation and suggest that you *gasp* didn't inherit your silverware.
Greeaaaat. More plastic, one-use items. Gawd knows we need that!
The ways this work can be interpreted are quite interesting. It is, however, rather ridiculous as an actual product, and a variety of flaws in the implementation and reasoning behind the idea detract from it.
As others have already noted, if the intention was actually to "reinforce the correct use of cutlery", more effort could have been put into making something that would display that correct use. While all the proprieties of table settings are certainly not agreed upon, with some sources, for example, considering the placement of utensils above the plate at all to be incorrect, I believe most everyone would agree the top fork and spoon are placed incorrectly. One could also question the alignment of the other utensils, the choice of setting, especially if it is meant for lunch, and the single plate, which could be seen as a charger but would be inconveniently shaped if it were meant to be used as one.
More interesting, however, is the prefabricated, inflexible nature of it all. Place settings are tailored to the particular meal, and can't simply be condensed into a single, mass produced form. The way this work contrasts a style of rigid mass production and disposable utensils with the usual style of diverse, flexible settings and valuable utensils is, in my opinion, one of its best aspects, but I'm not sure it was intentional. The way the description is written, along with the actual design, make me fear that the entire idea might have only been devised as a simple mockery of formality, without due consideration for any deeper meaning, a fear that is only increased by the last picture, where there isn't even an attempt to use the settings properly.
In fact, I'm rather confused by the site: I'm never quite certain whether my sense of humour is impaired or overly sensitive, and so don't know whether the entire site is actually a bit of a joke, as I suspect it may be. If this is actually meant to be an example of product design, it doesn't inspire any confidence in the designer's ability at all.
As an aside about the design, for those interested in such things, it should be noted that the designer is English; I would therefore tend to assume that the top utensils are for pudding, and that there is no setting for a salad. However, as I noted before, the whole thing doesn't make any sense; the description repeatedly describes it as being meant for lunch.
When i read "fine dining cutlery" my hopes soared! With the word "Plastic" they crashed. Make one out of silver!
Why does plastic have to be a one-use item? I hand-wash 'em and throw 'em in the "silver*ware" drawer. Just like those disposable plastic boxes. I usually get a couple years out of them.
But they go into a different drawer.
A cupboard, actually.
*as if.
How refreshing! An argument about the correct use/placement of cutlery instead of the usual political/environmental/technology brouhahas. I'm always amazed at the wide-ranging interests and expertise of BB readers. :)
My mom, who was our family table-setting expert and enforcer, would have loved to have seen this.
Not only did I not inherit my silverwear I also bought my own furniture, the shame is hard to bear. But on the upside I don't own any fish knives.
reading the word "whilst" so often is really becoming quite annoying to me.
Kind of a bachelor's dream, these are. Still a lot of wasted plastic involved.
How do you use it? Every time you'd pick up a fork or spoon, the food would fall off the plate.
(No, I'm not really that stupid.)
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8c/Waribashi(rikyuu).JPG
I've always enjoyed 'fine dinning'.
..This is what you give a model builder and his wife for a wedding present - a kitbashed dining set!
Agree with the comments about placement: either the dessert fork and spoon should be on the inside left and right, or they should be placed directly above the plate... I have never seen them placed as here... although we have probably discussed the product in rather more detail due to that misplacement than we would have done if they were correctly placed.
Having visited the main site and seen the other pictures, the other problem with it as a product would be the size - the plate which looks like a dinner plate in the pictures appears to be a tea plate instead. How the people in the pictures on the website are to snap their cutlery from the surround without finding their fish and chips in their laps is a mystery.
I can only welcome this once they develop the long-promised, and hopefully solar-powered gadget that will produce the cups/cutlery/crockery required for dinner, and then will accept back the used cups/cutlery/crockery allowing them to be pulverised and used as raw materials for the following day's set. With a hygienic and inert sludge being produced for fertilising the garden from the food scraps adhering to the plates, and no washing up!