The children's bedroom
Nowadays, most, if not all components of playhouses, infant bouncers, changing tables, prams and tricycles are made from petrochemicals-derived products. However nostalgic we may be about old wooden and metal toys, we cannot help acknowledging the higher safety of today's playthings: lighter, easier to process, they cause much less damage when coming into contact with a child's head or foot!
Children may not be overly concerned with their own safety, but they certainly know what they like to play with and why. Some petrochemical-based materials are chosen for their rigidity and are used in toy cars, for example, or bicycle helmets, or the desktop on which children do their homework. Some are selected for their flexibility and are used in dolls' limbs. Some are used for their light weight: as any parent struggling with a pram in a busy underground station can tell you, manoeuvring a modern one requires less muscle power today. And did you know that the colourful building bricks we have known for years are made using a very specific petrochemical-derived plastic, called ABS, with enough rigidity for the bricks to fit into each other strongly and sufficient flexibility for children to be able to take them apart again?
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