DIY eco eyeglasses made out of a Sprite bottle
(Credit:
Designboom)
You've heard of Coke bottle glasses. But you probably haven't heard of Sprite bottle glasses.
That's the concept that Suning Chen from China came up for the "RE-think + RE-cycle" design competition organized by Designboom way back in 2005. I just happened to come across this little DIY project while doing a Google search on PET (polyethylene terephthalate) bottles. (A public relations representative sent me a release on an upcoming Ecogear backpack made out of recycled PET bottles and I wasn't sure what PET stood for).
Naturally, you could make these glasses out of any plastic bottle, but if you really want to be green, you probably have to go with Sprite, Mountain Dew, or Sierra Mist. I'm not sure of the UV protection on these, however.
Anybody want to guess what that ring is (hint: it's not a nose ring)?
(Source: Designboom)
Hunkered down in New York City, Executive Editor David Carnoy covers the gamut of gadgets and writes his Fully Equipped column, which carries the tag line "The electronics you lust for." He's also the author of "Knife Music," a novel. E-mail David. Follow David on Twitter. 
- by Yvonne_cp July 13, 2009 8:55 AM PDT
- If they offer UV protection and/or polarization, that'd be interesting.
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(9 Comments)According to a white paper by Milliken Chemicals (http://www.packagingdigest.com/contents/pdf/Milliken%20White%20Paper%20-%20UV%20Absorbers%20for%20PET.pdf), fairly standard PET absorbs UV from about 100 to 320 nm.
As a very sloppy rule-of-thumb (I'm not a doctor, and I'm not giving medical advice), UV-A (aka LW UV) ranges from 315 to 400 nm, and it's not considered particularly harmful to eyes. Shorter wavelengths of UV-B and UV-C (315 nm down to about 160 nm) is of more concern.
I couldn't find any info quickly on whether PET polarizes visible light.