Upcycling

Abstract

Persistently, we take natural resources, turn them into valued products and, after a while, consider them trash and dispose of them. A sustainable alternative to this sequence is upcycling: the perfect mix between ‘upgrading’ and ‘recycling’. To upgrade is to add value and to recycle is to reuse. In the simplest terms, upcycling is the practice of taking something that is disposable and transforming it into something of greater value. Therefore, when we upcycle, we create something better out of what is already at hand. Upcycling counters the argument that an object has no value once it is disposed of, or that it must be destroyed before it can re-enter a new circle of production and value-creation. In Plastic bags: Living with rubbish, Hawkins (2001) argues that disposal is the logic of mass production: ‘Mass production of objects and their consumption depends on the widespread acceptance of, even taking pleasure in, exchangeability; replacing the old, the broken, the out of fashion with the new. The capacity for serial replacement is also the capacity to throw away without concern’¹ (cited in Emgin, 2012). Upcycling is based on sustainable consumption, and the main idea is to revitalise old material by placing it into new constellations and by suggesting new ways of using it while, at the same time, keeping its essence intact as a main value-adding feature of the process.