Result of my research into using discarded materials to make something functional

Hello There,

I do apologise for not updating my blog all this time. I have been very busy burning candles at both ends. My dilemma has been about seaching for a way to make some of my up-cycled creations into a finished product that will be ready for marketing.

It has been an uphill task to source manufacturers to help with the prototyping of the various products as well as finding the wherewithall to fund such projects.

So far, I have made ‘spool blinds’ using the spools from till roll receipts which are a by-product of most retailing establishments. Most of the spools that were used for this research were obtained from Southeastern train station ticket offices (London Bridge Station, Charing Cross Station and Cannon Street station. Also, underground stations at London Bridge and Stratford, including the National Express Ticket offices at London Liverpool street and stratford. Other Outlets that cooperated with me on this project are Morrisons supermarket, The Pound Stretcher store, Sainsbury’s Local, Boots The Chemists, Apple Jack’s health shop all of which are based in Stratford.

The problems that I encountered were with staff at the main sainsbury’s in the Stratford shopping centre. The staff were most uncooperative and nonchalant about saving the spools for me, which I felt was rather unfortunate. Even when I made posters to display in their mess room to inform the staff and encourage them to join in the drive to reduce waste that ends up in landfill sites. Excuses i got ranged from; they tend to forget; or the information was not passed around enough. The supervisors were incapable of getting the staff to save any spools. This went on for the whole duration of this project which was approximately six months.

The general attitude was that they just didn’t care. I feel that the various retailers need to educate their staff and get them to cooperate with anybody in the future who is doing a collection of discarded waste for an up-cycling project.

Generally, I think the project has been a success which can be measured by the evidence of the final outcome and was exhibited at both the graduate show at the University of East London and New Designers.

The next stage now is to take it to the next level and incorporate mechanisms that will enable it to work as a proper window blind and then we will be done.

I am presently exploring all the different concepts with regard to this end to see what works.

Also, another issue is the viability of the product. How can it be made in huge numbers without deploying the use of huge manpower? So far I am looking into sourcing a spray painting firm who can colour them en-masse. But they also have to be sanded down and so I’m looking for a way that this can be done rather than by hand. I reckon that there should be some kind of acid that can do this. When it’s done then the next stage would be to send them to the firm to paint them.

There is no problem as such about sourcing the material because we have 25 railway companies in the UK who use the same thermal till roll receipt system and in addition to this there are hundreds of shops in the London area alone. It will just be a matter of arranging the logistics of collecting them from the various retail sites and providing a recycling bin specifically for the spools.

Furthermore, I have made a room partitioning out of cardboard spools and embelished them with swarovski crystals as a decorative pendant that hangs from the modular shapes. The idea is that the crystals would catch the light and sparkle, giving the feeling of luxury and glamour. The modular spools are also wrapped in metres of metalic ribbons for that added effect.

Another product that has been designed from these modular cardboard spools are ladies fashion shoes. In a collaboration with Dawn Fuller, we have designed these shoes and adapted the modular shape into the heel of the shoes. I came up with the concept without any idea how it was going to work. But Dawn has applied her own technical knowledge in shoemaking and redesigned them by breaking it down to various parts and patterns that will aid the maker to piece them together enabling it to work as shoes that are safe to wear.

Finally, during the summer, I have used the same modular spools to make a Christmas decorative wall hanging called the Christmas story, which was entered into the Tigerprint ‘GIFTED’ competition as a sustainable design. The spools were sawn through and arranged in an abstract form of a Christmas tree, painted in metalic colours and then embelished with rock crystals. The hollows were then panelled with metalic cardboards, those in the spine were impressed with images of the nativity in metallic foil and some cardboard cut-outs for the star and bell.

My aim now is to be able to accept commissions and hopefully, a reasonable amount of orders.

One area I am looking into now is to make a latex sheath to frame the shape and hold it together in order for it to be more durable and resilient.

Above are some images of the aforementioned products.