Description: Yellow plastic vessel shaped like a rounded cone with a sealed base and an open top. Wider at top than at base. The orange base is detachable and shaped like a flower. Both the vessel and base can stand independently, but when fitted together the vessel is sturdier.

Construction: The object is extremely light and unsubstantial. The "tapping and squeezing test" reveals that the plastic is malleable. While there are no decorations applied to the object, the color and shape serve a decorative function. The bright misty translucent yellow is complimented by the sharp orange of the flower-shaped base. This colorfulness is reminiscent of fruit or candy. The object is factory produced and of high enough quality to not be easily destructible. The "#3" embossed on the base is indicative of assembly line production.

Speculation: This object was created as a vessel for containing objects (any that can fit). It is meant to be gripped around the centre. The colorfulness is reminiscent of fruit or candy. It appears to belong to a genre of patio/garden/picnic crockery as is common with bright plastic objects of this type. The object is used exclusively in the domestic sphere for containing liquids of all types, especially coffee and tea. The object is not particularly adept at this function, as plastic does not insulate from the heat.

Provenance: This object is currently used to hold liquids of all kinds, particularly hot drinks such as coffee and tea. It is owned by my roommate and is a fairly new acquisition.

Significance: This object is regulated to use in the domestic sphere because of the oddity of its shape and color. While the owner enjoys its appearance, this is partly due to its "tacky" nature as "it is not the sort of object one would drink from in public."

This object is a highly innovative application of the use of plastic. As such, it may belong to the futuristic "utopian" category of design. Furthermore, as a vessel made of plastic it is evokes of modern technological values-cheap mass production reaching economies of scale. The fact that most of us still value glass and ceramic drinking vessels over plastic ones, may result from our resistance to change, as Forty suggests.