David Graas - Not A Lamp
Lamp packaged in itself. Content: not a lamp.
What do most of you do to the shoe boxes that you ‘bought’ together with your shoe purchases? Do you keep them or throw them away? For me, I generally keep them. I will use them to store my old shoes. In my shoe closest rests many shoe boxes with shoes that I no longer wear. The purpose of their existence now is no longer to provide comfort to my feet but to collect dust.
Economist Richard Thaler suggests:
“The more expensive they were, the more often you’ll try to wear them. Eventually, you’ll stop wearing them, but you won’t get rid of them. And the more you paid for them, the longer they’ll sit in the back of your closet. At some point, after the shoes have been fully ‘depreciated’ psychologically, you will finally throw them away.”
This is what Mr. Thaler calls “sunk cost”.
Wonder what does this got to do with Green Design?
In my recent research into the solid waste recycling in Singapore, I learnt that the amount of paper and cardboard waste generated tops all of other waste streams in Singapore. The paper and cardboard waste accounts to almost the same amount of both plastics and food waste combined. I know some may say that this isn’t a fair comparison as the statistic is also paper and cardboard waste combined. And we all know that we use a great deal of paper.
But if you would just take a quick look around you, consider how many products that you purchased have entered your house in some form of cardboard packaging? I don’t know about you. But I sure see lots of them in my house. Just on my desktop alone, I can find my laptop, my printer, my speakers, my ipod, even my copic markers and pencils, all came in cardboard boxes, just a variation of colors. If I were to walk around my house, I am sure I can find even more.
Are these packaging necessary? Yes, to a large extend, I know most packagings are necessary because they aid in the logistics and transportation. But even if they do, are there other means to reduce or reuse them, than to send them to incineration or landfills or in a more eco-friendly way – recycle them, once they performed their task of ‘safekeeping’ the products into our homes?
I know of many designers that are working on making the packaging into a product itself. One of my former classmates suggested a concept of converting the cardboard boxes that we used in home shifting into temporary furniture for the new homes. AndI really like the idea.
Today I stumbled into some designs by David Graas, a designer from Netherlands, via Treehugger.
David Graas - Not A Box
This lamp comes as a box with all parts inside (bulb, plug, cable etc. + manual). You cut top and bottom yourself and then install. The cut out of the lamp shape functions as a graphical image of the lamp that could be inside the box, but is not.
David Graas - Don’t spill your coffee table
Coffee table made up from corrugated cardboard parts that are flatpacked and slide together for easy assembly.
David Graas - The FYS (Finish Your Self) stool
You not only assemble this stool yourself, but, because product and packaging are both made from cardboard, also finish it yourself. Two parts of the stool are simply cut loose from the box where the remaining six parts are packaged in.
David Graas - FYS (Finish Your Self) Junior
Puzzle your own chair together (with a little help from mama) using a large part of the packaging. The chair is made from corrugated cardboard and is 100% recyclable.
After looking through some of his designs and reading through his design philosophy/motivation, to do agree that there is a need for us, especially designers, to re-look into the concept of packaging and waste.
Here is what Graas wrote:
“Garbage is poorly designed. In many cases the only way to deal with it is to burn it or burry it deep into the ground.
Why didn’t we consider this when we designed this garbage in the first place? It’s not that it happened overnight. Actually it took a great effort to produce the materials and shape them into products. First they were designed. Many things were taken into account; shape, material, price, color, aesthetics, taste, packaging, etc. Then they were produced; trees cut, iron casted, plastic moulded. Then marketing was used to sell the products. They were transported to shops and finally sold.
But this, of course, is not the final stage. The product-stage is only a temporary one. Sooner or later (nowadays more sooner then later…) a product becomes garbage. People are continuously seduced by new products. More advanced, more features, more comfort. Or just new. New is delicious!
So the discarded products end up somewhere else. It’s not that they disappear. You can discard them from your home, but you cannot discard them from the planet. It’s a closed system. And everything you throw away will eventually come back to you like a boomerang.
Wouldn’t it be nice if the discarded products would not cause problems for the environment? That you could throw them away without feeling guilty? Or the materials could be completely re-used without much effort? Maybe garbage could even be so advanced that it is beneficiary for the environment?
Sounds crazy?
I don’t think so. It is just a matter of good design; using the right materials and the right production methods and applying the right design.
So let’s stop designing better products and start designing better garbage!”
[ Source : Davidgraas.com ]
