Plastic has shaped our daily lives like no other material. Originally associated with convenience, progress, even revolution, today plastic seems to have lost its utopian appeal. Plastic is everywhere, yet most conspicuous as waste and as a key factor in the global environmental crisis. This book examines the success story of plastic in the twentieth century and at the same time presents the different discourses on how we should manage the waste the material produces and also find solutions that take into account its entire life cycle in the future.

Mark Miodownik, Susan Freinke l, and Nanjala Nyabola each contribute an essay that sheds light on the history of plastics from 1850 to today. A material-rich visual chronology illustrates how consumers' perception of plastics has changed over the decades. Brief descriptions of a selection of 50 objects examine the importance of plastics for material culture. Reprints of fundamental texts about the history of plastics―for example by Alexander Parkes and Roland Barthes―provide a context from the history of ideas.

The book reflects the current discourse and state of research on plastic with numerous individual interviews and panel discussions that were held with designers, representatives from industry, researchers, and environmental activists. Underpinning these conversations are comprehensive data visualizations on plastic production and consumption, recycling.

塑料对我们日常生活的影响是其他材料无法比拟的。它最初与方便、进步、甚至革命联系在一起，如今似乎已经失去了它乌托邦式的吸引力。塑料无处不在，但作为废物和全球环境危机的关键因素，却尤为明显。本书研究了塑料在20世纪的成功故事，同时提出了关于我们应该如何管理这种材料产生的废物的不同论述，并找到了考虑到其未来的整个生命周期的解决方案。

马克·米奥多尼克（Mark Miodownik）、苏珊·弗林克尔（Susan Freinkel）和南亚拉·尼亚博拉（Nanjala Nyabola）各写了一篇文章，阐明了从1850年到今天的塑料史。一份材料丰富的视觉年表说明了几十年来消费者对塑料的看法是如何变化的。对所选的50件物品的简要描述考察了塑料对物质文化的重要性。关于塑料史的基本文献的转载，如亚历山大·帕克斯（Alexander Parkes）和罗兰·巴特（Roland Barthes）的文献，提供了思想史的背景。

本书通过与设计师、工业界代表、研究人员和环境活动家进行的个人访谈和小组讨论，反映了当前关于塑料的讨论和研究状况。这些对话的基础是关于塑料生产和消费、回收的全面数据可视化。