Possibly the world's most impressive paper plane
February 3, 2014 -- Updated 1018 GMT (1818 HKT)
Luca Iaconi-Stewart
has spent the past five years -- around 10,000 man hours -- making a
minutely detailed, 1:60 scale replica of an Air India Boeing 777 out of
manila folders.
HIDE CAPTION
All that's missing? Paper pilots
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- 22-year-old aviation junkie makes minutely detailed miniature replica of Boeing 777
- 10,000 hours and 400 manila folders later, there are only the wings to go
- "Beauty" of jet liner's form attracted Iaconi-Stewart to the project
Oh, and maybe some nerve-jangling turbulence.
And reassuring pilots.
Twenty-two-year-old San Franciscan Luca Iaconi-Stewart has done what any self-respecting airplane fanatic would do.
He's got his own.
Unlike, say, John
Travolta, however, who owns and flies five planes including a Boeing
707-138, Iaconi-Stewart's craft is more befitting his age and status.
It's four feet long.
And made of cardboard.
And he built it himself.
Meet the model-maker: Luca Iaconi-Stewart.
Plane crazy?
A plane made out of
cardboard? Sounds like something that might end up, sadly askew, in the
corner of the room the morning after a bored frat boys' night before.
Not this 1:60 scale,
painstakingly detailed replica of an Air India Boeing 777 made entirely
out of manila folders -- and a little glue -- and currently parked in a
mini-hanger somewhere whose location Iaconi-Stewart understandably
declines to disclose.
In case it gets
hijacked, or whatever the paper-plane equivalent is, and the 10,000
hours he estimates he's devoted to the project over the past
five-and-a-half years, off and on, go to waste.
Not to mention squandering enough manila folders -- he reckons around 400 -- to give your average stationery manager apoplexy.
It's hard to believe
when you look at the fantastically precise rendering of the twinjet
craft -- from the undercarriage tire tread, through the gorgeous
undulation of the engine-fan blades and the class-conscious carving of
economy, business and first class seats to the chunky font of the
airplane livery -- but Iaconi-Stewart is entirely untrained as a model
maker, aside from the odd architecture class at school.
Mundane material
It's equally incredible that his Lilliputian creation is made from something as mundane as manila folders.
But that's what he liked
about them -- that they're "a really unassuming material [and] readily
available," Iaconi-Stewart tells CNN.
Formally untrained he might be, but one qualification he surely does possess is an unusual temerity and focus.
Each economy class seat,
for instance, took 20 minutes of cutting, folding, fiddling and gluing
-- and those of us who fly economy know there are a lot of seats.
The fold-out wombs of business class devoured up to six hours of Iaconi-Stewart's labor each.
First class "suites" -- hey, there's a reason people shell out for them -- took eight hours a go: an average working day.
Plane fan: Some parts look like sculpture.
Drawing from scratch
Progress on the plane
was especially "tricky" in the beginning, Iaconi-Stewart says, because
"there were no publicly available [assembly] drawings.
"I spent a lot of time making drawings from pictures.
"Then I got hold of a maintenance manual for people who maintain airplanes.
"It contains plenty of detail, which is useful for specific parts, but you're still having to draw everything from scratch.
"It consumes a lot of
time," he says a little wistfully, some of which, you hope, he's also
devoting to dating and perhaps even enjoying his new-found freedom to
buy a beer.
Winging it
Iaconi-Stewart's only got the wings to go now -- they'll make the plane 3.5 feet across from tip to tip.
He's hoping to be done
by the summer but, given that the engines took almost half a year from
planning to completion, this last stage probably won't be a doddle.
Then -- obvious question -- will it fly?
No -- idiot! -- "it's a static model.
"In theory, it could fly if I designed it properly but it'd have to be a lot lighter and with more moving parts."
Economical: Cattle-class took 20 minutes a seat.
Terrorist evil genius?
Another obvious question
these days: has he been tackled to the sidewalk by an FBI agent as a
suspected evil genius terrorist in training?
"No -- although I do get asked that a lot."
And what next?
A helicopter made out of blancmange?
Well, turns out it wasn't just aviation enthusiasm that made Iaconi-Stewart shrink a plane.
It was "aesthetic choice," he says.
Nice proportions
They may sometimes be hell to ride in but we forget that a jetliner is a beautiful, streamlined thing.
"They have nice proportions," the model maker says.
"Choosing a plane was a visual decision for me.
"An impulse."
But it's "not something I would dive back into. Not that I don't enjoy it but it can be isolating at times and frustrating.
"I want to do something more normal."
Find out more about Luca Iaconi-Stewart's Boeing 777 project at his Flickr page and on his YouTube channel.
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