KUPAS SENI Jurnal Seni dan Pendidikan Seni ISSN 2289-4640 /eISSN 0127-9688 /Vol. 7 (2019) / (81-86) 81 CONSERVATION APPROACH OF UNDERUTILIZED SCREW-PINE LEAVES (DAUN MENGKUANG) MATERIAL: HOME ACCESSORIES DESIGN MADE OF SCREW-PINE LEAVES BIO-COMPOSITE Izyan Syamimi Khairul Aidil Azlin Abd Rahman Saiful Hasley Ramli Faculty of Design and Architecture, Universiti Putra Malaysia izyank.zainol@gmail.com Abstract Screw-pine leaves is a material that widely used by local crafter to produce a daily necessity product in old time. With the fast-growing ability, the leaves are easy to be found wild in several areas in Asia. In this the modern lifestyle, Malaysian did not used the material as much as the old time. Therefore, the material has been underutilized material. As a popular craft material, screw-pine leaves are proven to be good material with decent strength and flexibility. Herein, the researcher seized an approach to conserve the utilization of screw-pine leaves as material by developing several home accessories product designs. Product design in this study is a stool, a lighting, a clock and a set of coasters. A set of questionnaires is created, and the attributes are selected through the KJ Method. The questionnaire is run online and validated offline. The analysis shows the differences between both online and offline method. The results, based on comparing the attributes, shows the respondent is positively accepting the form of the design yet least putative on the visual. While among the 4 products, the coaster design is the most acceptable product calculated followed by the stool. Though, other analysis shows that the lighting design is the most prospective product to display the potential of screw-pine leaves bio-composite. Through the study, the application of screw-pine leaves bio-composite demonstrates the example of utilization of screw-pine leaves could lead a new product line in screw-pine leaves industry in Malaysia. Keywords: Screw-pine leaves, Bio-composite, home accessories product. INTRODUCTION As one the main material used in local craft, screw-pine leaves or locally called daun mengkuang is one of the industries that highly known bring up the Malaysian handcraft industry. The application of screw-pine leaves which widely known with the skillful of hand weaving product, is mostly a daily necessity product such as mats, cloth organizer, food cover, etc. With the least demanding on those kinds of product that been preferable in different material as plastics 1 , the screw-pine leaves industry profit is fully depending on the custom art craft for several occasions and small tourism business (Ismail, 2016). However, this is not the only issue, according to Nor Hatina Shuib (2018), the falling number of the professional plaiter, and the company that still running the business 2 is another subject that could lead to the extinction of this heritage business. According to Plant use (2016) screw-pine leaves is an easy plant to be found in place with high volume of water content such as swampy area, riverside, and coastal area 3 . The researcher also identifies that there are 3 types of screw-pine leaves is being used in Malaysia art-craft industry depending on the type of product. Plant Use (2016) also mention among all the screw-pine leaves species, Pandanus Atrocarpus or locally called Mengkuang Minyak have the strongest characteristic 3 . It is also a flexible plant that easy to adapt to various types of soil said Thomson and others (2006) 4 . In addition, the screw- Article Info: Received Date: 24 August 2019 Accepted Date: 21 September 2019 Published Date: 23 September 2019 Corresponding Author: izyank.zainol@gmail.com