A sculpture of The Table Bay Hotel’s mascot, Oscar the seal, has been made out of used coffee capsules.
General manager of the hotel, Joanne Selby, said when she learnt about sculpture artist Godfrey Dambuleni creating beautiful works made from used Nespresso capsules, she commissioned the artist to make a version of the seal using spent capsules from the hotel.
The story of Oscar and his friendship with a lonely fisherman is the stuff of legends and is closely intertwined with the history of The Table Bay hotel. Oscar was named after the kind-hearted fisherman with whom the seal shared an unlikely friendship.
The story has been told in a children’s book, Oscar! by photographer and publisher, Marc Hoberman.
Mr Dambuleni runs a studio in Salt River, employing a team of seven who help him prepare the raw materials including recycled tins and sheet metal, bicycle chains and used aluminium coffee capsules with which he creates artworks, including sculptures and trophy heads of African animals.
“I have been using Nespresso capsules for almost five years, making elephants, rhinos, human beings and more,” said Mr Dambuleni. “Oscar was the first seal I had ever made and took me about three weeks to make.”
The seal sculpture was made from 3 000 capsules and is 1.5m high.
“The aluminium coffee capsules are a very useful material, being soft and malleable they can be used in many ways.”
Mr Dambuleni said his team clean out the coffee grounds and flatten the capsules to make small sheets of metal.
They use the coffee grounds as fertiliser to grow vegetables.
Ms Selby said The Table Bay Hotel took sustainable awareness very seriously, recycling plastic, cardboard, aluminium and glass.
“We are excited to give Oscar the Nespresso seal pride of place,” she said.