A bread clip is a low-tech device used to hold plastic bags closed. It is one of those objects with a form somewhat foreign to its function: it looks more like a piece of a table game than something designed to keep the bread fresh longer. Perhaps its shape is too sophisticated, geometrically speaking, or too abstract, for what it does. Perhaps it is the fact that its shape shows how it was manufactured, using a die-cutting process. There is something about the rigidity of the clip and the organic, non-structural nature of the plastic bag it keeps closed that is worth thinking about. All this in the small size of 7/8” x 7/8” (2.2 x 2.2 cm.), although there are some bread clip variations, for example a rectangular version featuring a larger gripping surface that eases the opening and closing process. I have always found low-tech objects reassuring in their unambiguous relationship between form, function and user interaction, specifically the fact that the majority of them explain with their form not only what their function is but also how they are used. The fact that the bread clip does not fully adhere to that principle, with its intriguing shape, explains that I found a number of objects that took that shape literally for their own purposes, creating formal clones with different functions and meaning; is that plagiarism, or just a legitimate way to reuse a really cool shape for aesthetic reasons?
