How can we bring a second life to our waste? In this master's program, we rethink the generation and mismanagement of all kinds of waste worldwide, and eventually addressed the growing issue of reducing and reusing waste by providing a solution with function and aesthetics.
In this master program, each team was assigned to discuss a unique topic under the same theme — the politics of design. It was such a novel experience for me because, unlike my previous education, the structure of the course was determined yet the actual content was to be led by our own development which meant it was different from group to group according to our assigned topic. After knowing our topic was code & conflict, the rest was on us to discover what it meant along with the theme and what's our next step.
I collaborated with an architect and a graphic designer on the whole project between October 2018 and January 2019. In addition, I led the final design approach part, including concept brainstorming, sketching, and prototyping.
We started off exploring how ‘Code & Conflict’ can be interpreted in the ‘politics of design’, particularly by examining some samples of journalism photography. This led us to ‘Think Twice’ about some examples of products, furniture and packaging, where the designs had either multiple or hidden design features or uses that were usually unnoticeable on initial observation, and were very ingenious. From this point, we also started to learn more about the amount of generation and mismanagement of different kinds of waste throughout the world. It started becoming apparent that our approach had in some way or the other, aim to address this growing issue of reducing and reusing waste.
After being exposed to multiple design references, it was definitely the time to start getting hands-on. Instead of working for a virtual requirement, our social experiment started with each of us listing down four products that we had a personal requirement for. They were randomly assigned to be ‘built’ by another member, as far as possible only using raw materials that were not bought, but found at home or in some or the other way. The relative success we got from the experiment gave a strong basis to the foundation of our thought, that a lot of things that were needed, need not be bought; and secondly, a lot of things that we classify as waste, might not necessarily be so.
.jpg)
After the social experiment, we used our surrounding environment as the scenario of our final deliverable. Germany arguably has one of the best waste management systems and a big part of the world looks up to them. But as designers committed to finding solutions in the direction of up-cycling and re-use, could we still find a pain point in this world-class system? We found that even though waste recycling is common in German, it comes at a price. From the carbon footprint of transporting the waste to the energy-intensive recycling process, recycling is sometimes less ‘green’ than we imagine it to be; definitely less than up-cycling, which not only negates the need for recycling but also prevents more products (future waste) to be manufactured. After analysing the general waste categories, we selected the combination of glass bottles with waste wood from the wood workshop, as the materials to design and develop a small range of home products that are designed with consideration towards aesthetics and function at the same time.
After a few rounds of prototyping, we created a few furniture pieces, including a shelf, a shoe rack, a coffee table, and a stool. We encountered some challenges during the creation process, such as discovering many small differences between the bottle's shape and colour which affected the furniture structure and aesthetics, some labels were extra hard to be removed and collecting enough waste wood for all products. However, what we really tried to achieve through this process was to design the structure of products so that they could be assembled without other materials, including any glue of course.
