{"id":23384,"date":"2021-05-17T22:43:28","date_gmt":"2021-05-17T14:43:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mag.addmaker.tw\/2021\/05\/17\/making-products-from-rice-hulls-pineapple-skin-and-bamboo-a-designer-firm-that-promotes-zero-carbon-initiative\/"},"modified":"2021-05-20T17:18:17","modified_gmt":"2021-05-20T09:18:17","slug":"cyclic-design-dot-design-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mag.addmaker.tw\/en\/2021\/05\/17\/cyclic-design-dot-design-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Making Products from Rice Hulls, Pineapple Skin, and Bamboo! A Designer Firm that Promotes \u2018Zero-Carbon\u2019 Initiative"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Circular economy is a concept generating much traction in recent years. On top of looks and functionality, designers and manufacturers should also emphasize how resources can be continuously used by the industry. However, circular economy is more than simply producing environmentally friendly products; the true implementation of circular design \u2013 including a product\u2019s materials, production processes, and recycling\/reuse \u2013 takes much more effort to practice. Some Taiwanese designers have begun implementing circular design, and Dot Design is one of them. <\/p>\n\n

Searching for safe and pollution-free materials<\/h2>\n\n

Circular economy covers many aspects. From design to production, consumption to after-use, relevant practices could be explored in each stage of a product\u2019s life cycle. In terms of product design, the first step in strategic design planning would be material selection. But what counts as a sustainable material?<\/p>\n\n

\u201cTake plastics for example. They are often considered to be unfriendly to the environment. But if we can truly reuse plastics, they could be excellent materials from a point of extending a product\u2019s lifetime. But there are so many reasons that prevent plastics from being recycled,\u201d said Lance Han, Founder and Design Director of Dot Design. There are 7 recycling codes for plastics based on the current legal environment in Taiwan. However, very few of which generate any value from being recycled and there are numerous factors that impact recycling, such as color-printed labels on the plastics\u2019 surface and mislabeled recycling codes etc. Ultimately, these non-recyclable plastics would be transported to either landfill or an incinerator.<\/p>\n\n

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Lance Han, Founder and Design Director of Dot Design.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n

Then again, many products are made from plastic compounds. Lance Han sighed that although the current laws around the world recognize such products as \u201clow-pollution, resource-saving and recyclable\u201d as long as their plastic content is under 25% and could be awarded with an environmental label, but given the existing recycling mechanism, these compound materials cannot be effectively recycled in reality.<\/p>\n\n

\u201cSo, is the entire operation actually eco-friendly? Since recycling is not as easy as we imagined, once you begin to question the entire recycling mechanism, as designers, we began to wonder whether we could develop new products that did not contain any plastics but are equally durable.\u201d Consequently, Dot Design began to collect a variety of materials, hoping to find something that would not pollute the Earth and were completely safe. \u201cIt is best to localize your circular materials since it reduces carbon footprint.\u201d Thus, Dot Design began by conceptualize based on local materials in Taiwan and created products from diverse zero-carbon materials including rice hulls, pineapple fibers, and bamboo fibers.<\/p>\n\n

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