Back to Nature´s Circular System

With the rise of veganism and eco-awareness worldwide, new materials and processes started to emerge, bringing along environmentally-sounding labels such as “eco”, “organic” and “bio”. However, taking a closer look, not everything is as “green” as it sounds...

[1] How To Not Be Fooled By Greenwashing

According to Merriam-Webster dictionary (2020) greenwashing is the act of misleading clients and potential customers into believing that a product or service is environmentally friendly. For example, currently mass-produced “vegan leather” is mostly PVC- and PU-based plastic, neither of which is biodegradable. Greenpeace (2003) argues that most common plastics consist of poisonous substances and pose serious threats to human health and the environment, PVC being one of the worst. Often, well-meaning consumers searching for consciously made products don’t realise the “vegan leather” options currently available on the market are anything but, harming the environment and animals who live there. Claiming the opposite is nothing but pure greenwashing. The environmental harm is imposed during the production of the materials, toxic chemical exposure during use, hazards from fires, as well as after the end of the product´s life in the waste crisis and breaking apart into micro-particles ingested by animals. While so many plastic products have a very short first-use cycle and are disposable, plastic as a material takes up to 1000 years to decompose in nature.

[2] Start of the material-making process

The problem may lie in the needless durability of the temporary products. Industries have learned to convert natural resources into uniform mass-produced materials which enable them to effortlessly produce large amounts of products that are not prone to natural decay. This has resulted in a wide array of materials no longer recognisable to the micro-organisms and enzymes that would normally decompose these items back to organic elements (Chapman, 2005). Production has stepped out of nature´s circular cycle creating a linear system of ever-lasting materials.

In light of the climate emergency, designers, as well as consumers, need to start taking responsibility for the material choices and consider the impact at the end of the product's life cycle (McDonough & Braungart, 2002). It is not enough to push the responsibility onto the large-scale factories, economies, and governments, everyone must carry their own weight. The changes start small and over time the pressure from single consumers will affect the large-scale industries to change. Especially designers should choose materials with extreme care, as they are responsible for the products available to consumers. The environment ought to be regarded as just another end user - one with specific demands and limitations. Sustainable design should, therefore, attain the needs of all its users: corporate, consumer and environment (Chapman, 2005).

[3] Bacterial cellulose is blended

A solution would be to model from nature´s circular production cycle, where all the waste goes safely back to the source as nutrients for other organisms and continue in the cycle as something new. The 20th century saw the boom of mass-industrialisation and globalisation, it was the era of stepping away from nature. In turn, the 21st century will, hopefully, will be the age for humanity to realise we are not separate from nature, we can´t live without it and will return to respectfully collaborating with what we are part of. Current systems just don´t work.

[4] Natural ingredients are added to the liquid mass

In response to this, I began my project looking for a fully organic material made from food waste, that would behave similarly to leather. The main criteria for the envisioned material were that it should be organic, water-resistant, durable but safely home-compostable at the end of its use and could theoretically be prepared at home. This would bring the material closer to the consumer, democratising it, and create an emotional bond with the material through personal engagement.

The final part of this project fell on the time of the first Covid-19 lockdown.

[5] Resulting in the spread that will dry into a new sheet material

A year ago, David Cross stated in his essay for the Material Futures catalogue, that as the climate breakdown had reached its tipping point it was still too hard to imagine bringing the contemporary world and its industries to a standstill. Decarbonisation seemed unthinkable. Suddenly, this was an unexpected reality!

At the start of it, the global pandemic of Covid-19 led to the complete shutdown of industries across the planet. Carbon emissions fell drastically in all of the world’s major cities and the effects of this on the environment were undoubtedly noticeable. Something that could not be imagined before was swiftly accomplished. Nature took care of itself and replenished quickly. The sky became clear with no planes in sight and no pollution, the birds were chirping outside louder than ever before in recent decades. This has shown the damage we are inflicting on nature is still recoverable. It has also proven governments can move quickly to regulate industries if they believe it is necessary.

[6] One of the ways of working with the material includes modular tessellation

My project adapted to the lockdown situation. It proved to be quite self-sufficient and did not have to change much. Maybe this is a hint to "do try this at home" and encourage more people to experiment with making their own materials from their food waste? Although my material is aimed at working with the small-scale industry, it can be home-made too. The troubled times of the coronavirus lockdown saw an increasing trend of new bakers indulging in the creative process in their homes. I would like to encourage people to engage with processing the waste SCOBY from their home Kombucha drink-making into their own craft materials to better connect with the concept and raise awareness of how materials can be made.

[7] It is time for designers to take the responsibility for the materials used

As the Union of Concerned Researchers in Fashion recently stated, the Covid-19 pandemic gave the designers an opportunity to take a moment to re-evaluate their practices. This was long overdue from the ecological aspect and an added momentum for the change. Perhaps rather than rushing back to business as usual post-pandemic, we as humanity could take this opportunity to re-evaluate and redesign the outdated industrial production and disposal systems. Could we come up with new, intelligent, and environmentally-friendly ones? Rather than polluting nature with materials production and disposal, could we nourish it with our waste? Could we ensure all the creatures on our planet thrive in sustainable living conditions, not just a selected percentage of one species?

Images:

[1] Anon (No Date) How To Not Be Fooled By Greenwashing. Available at: https://www.100daysofrealfood.com/greenwashing-dont-be-fooled/

[2-7] Tayla Horn (2020) process images of making SCOBY-compo material

References:

Chapman, J, 2005, Emotionally Durable Design, Earthscan, UK

McDonough, W & Braungart, M, 2002, Cradle to Cradle, North Point Press, New York Random House, UK

Cross, D, 2019, “Decarbonisation and Decolonisation: Liberation?”, Material Futures catalogue, London, UK

Greenpeace, PVC: The Poison Plastic, 2003, viewed 1 May 2020, <https://www.greenpeace.org/usa/wp-content/uploads/legacy/Global/usa/report/2009/4/pvc-the-poison-plastic.html>

Merriam-Webster, 2020, viewed 1 May 2020, <https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/greenwashing?utm_campaign=sd&utm_medium=serp&utm_source=jsonld>

Union of Concerned Researchers in Fashion, 2020, Earth Day Open Letter to the Fashion Sector: Put Earth First in the wake of COVID-19

BS2780 : 1983, British Standard Glossary of Leather Terms, British Standards Institution, UK

Written by: Riina Õun, 2020