The value that designers bring to us goes beyond the outer appearance of the design.
Their real value is in unearthing the story that resides in every item, using it as a toehold on a new solution for the challenges of the real world, and hopefully bringing the consumer to realize, “I really did need this item in my life!!”
The “10,000 Creators Meet PASS THE BATON” project is part of our New Recycling at Pass the Baton. This time we brought creators and designers into the mix by working with Loftwork.com which has over 10,000 designer/creator members.
We started the project in April 2013 by asking for design ideas for the recycle/reuse of batches of dead stock and imperfect items donated by four companies. From all the submissions received, and after a lot of discussion and prototyping with the creators, seven items were chosen to be put into production.
What is the chemical reaction in the encounter of object and creator, with the addition of the accumulated wisdom of others?
— Take a good look at that process, plus the wonderful objects it created.
Project Planning & Management: Loftwork, Smiles
Judges: Chiaki Hayashi (Loftwork), Ryosuke Uehara (Kigi), Yoshie Watanabe (Kigi), Masamichi Toyama (Smiles)
Cooperation: Akasaka Kakiyama, Neal’s Yard Remedies, AS Corporation, JIN Co Ltd
Exhibits
Products will be debuted for sale at the following exhibits:
Pass The Baton gallery (Omote-sando, Tokyo)
・Exhibit: March 20 (Thu) thru April 13 (Sun), 2014
・Address: Omote-sando Hills Nishikan B2F, 4-12-10 Jingumae, Shibuya-ku Tokyo
＊Products are displayed for sale together with the story of their creation in a gallery format
FabCafe Tokyo (Shibuya, Tokyo)
・Exhibit: April 1 (Tue) thru April 13 (Sun), 2014
・Address: Dogenzaka Pia 1F, 1-22-7 Dogenzaka, Shibuya-ku Tokyo
At Exhibit Opening
Chiaki Hayashi (Loftwork)
The “10,000 Creators Meet Pass the Baton” project was like a battle of the creators.
Scraps of camel’s hair fabric, eyeglass frame leftovers, used skincare containers, imperfect rice crackers. All these items were guaranteed to tickle the fancy of the designer spirit.
This exhibition shows the completed products designed and made by seven designers.
What was the designer’s perspective and process for breathing new life into each of these materials?
We want you to enjoy seeing these creations from the designer’s point of view.
All these materials have unlimited potential.
Let us know what you see in them too.
Masamichi Toyama (Smiles)
Getting together with creators to make something, nobody wants to compromise and the design is changed any number of times.
Cost has to be considered, and nothing works out as intended. All of a sudden, a year has gone by.
After all that, these are the creations that finally came into being.
This whole project came from the idea of avoiding waste, and so the ultimate results are as simple as they can be.
These ideas were the ones left standing after being selected and pared down from all the many ideas we had from 10,000 Creators. They are simple but super-refined like a gourmet premium sake. Give them a try.
