Waste Age: What Can Design Do?

Interesting exhibition at the Design Museum looking at what design can do to reduce waste in what we produce and consume.

You enter the show through some shocking statistics some too huge to take in, such as the world produces 2bn tonnes of rubbish a year, seven times the weight of the world’s population, and others more personal such as a T shirt is worn an average of seven times in its life. There were some good installations/art works to bring these figures to life such as a large handing made of plastic bottle tops which was just one winter’s worth from the beaches of Cornwall.

There was a fascinating section on how we got to this place with a timeline on the invention of plastics and the introduction of convenience goods. I could see how, unwittingly, we were all involved in this. It looked at how we planned obsolescence into the life spam of a product to boost the economy after the Depression and the Second World War.

The show became more positive when it began to look at solutions. Some of these seemed simple and obvious but others were rather niche and expensive. I loved the idea of Repair Cafes where people can bring broken items to get them mended or learn how to mend them. It was also interesting to see end of use ideas starting to be built into products. There was a section on new products such as a wall made of sugar waste but I must admit it did smell a bit odd.

I do want a moan about labels though! I lot of them were on the floor. The description was hard to read and any detail on who had designed the work, sold it etc virtually impossible without crouching down. Surely part of the point is that people can leave a show like this with ideas about products to look for or designers to contact.

Closed 20 February 2022

Review

Evening Standard


 

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