This is the first piece in a series exploring cork from designer and educator Daniel Michalik. As a prelude to this series, Michalik produced a beautiful photo gallery documenting the cork harvest.
Some years ago, while working on my MFA at RISD's Furniture Design Department, I came across an industrial supplier in Northern Maryland with a warehouse full of old cork slabs he wanted to unload. The price was incredibly low, so I bought three pallets. I intended to use the 1.5" cork sheeting in a chair seat I had been thinking about. However, the sheer quantity of cork and my potent will to procrastinate won over. I was unable to resist getting into the woodshop and experimenting with these cork slabs in any way I could imagine.
I tried every technique I could think of—I cut, glued, turned, cast, compressed, stretched, molded, laminated and broke the material over and over. I began to see one new form after another. For the first time in my life, I was seeing a material perform in entirely new ways. I felt as if I had woken up in a new, uncharted world.
