Plastics Now ─ On Architecture's Relationship to a Continuously Emerging Material

Plastics Now addresses one primary question: why do we build with plastics the way that we do?

For decades, plastics have been described over and over again as "the future" – yet we still do not know precisely what to do with them. Billie Faircloth argues that this inertia is due to plastics’ indecipherability, which has prevented them from becoming fully known.

The author tracks the process by which plastics became defined as a class of building materials. Drawing on new, original data from the industry press, beautifully drawn original timelines, hundreds of historical and contemporary images, advertisements dating to the 1950s, and technical data, this unconventional book explores the emergence of plastics as a building material and presents new findings.

Written by the research director of the internationally renowned, award-winning firm KieranTimberlake,Plastics Now takes a provocative approach that calls on architects to participate in the redefinition of plastics for our time. Essential reading for professional architects and architecture students to engage with our shared history with the plastics industry.

Billie Faircloth is a practicing architect and research director at KieranTimberlake, where she leads trans-disciplinary research, design, and problem-solving processes across fields including environmental management, chemical physics, materials science, and architecture. She fosters collaboration between trades, academies, and industries in order to define a relevant problem-solving boundary for the built environment.