The highlight of this exhibit is definitely the Peggy Chair, constructed with over 20kg of plastic saved from landfills, rivers and the ocean.

It was designed by Space Available, an Indonesia-based collective of designers, artists, scientists and environmentalists. As per its namesake, the visually-striking Peggy Chair was made in collaboration with cool South Korean DJ Peggy Gou.

The Meditation Chair stands out as well − a colourful woven object made with plastic strips derived from ocean waste.

Singaporean designer and educator Hans Tan is the brains behind this one. The collection’s porcelain vessels were actually unwanted goods sourced from thrift stores and other old shops.

Now, Tan has breathed new life into them through a resist-blasting technique, where parts of the original glaze are removed. Replacing them are new contemporary motifs, resulting in a stylish end product that certainly warrants a place in your home .

Sea Stone centres around one of the most forgotten forms of waste − seashells.

Often discarded by the seafood industry, they’re now put to good use by being transformed into aesthetic homeware. The seashells have been grounded by hand, avoiding the use of electricity and heat to minimise carbon footprint.

The design studio behind the project is Seoul-based Newtab-22, whose founders Hyein Choi and Jihee Moon possess a keen interest in exploring natural and overlooked materials.

You’ve probably heard of homegrown label Laat, a collab between multi- disciplinary artist Alvin Tan and interior designer Cherin Tan. The duo focus on repurposing waste materials into furniture pieces and lifestyle objects, and have done so brilliantly with Monolith.

In this exhibit, European marble offcuts from factories, unused mild steel and panels of mirrors (garnered from contractors) are composed into abstract geometric homeware. The statement-making pieces are then finished off with raw concrete.

Founded by aeronautical engineer Ryan Mario Yasin, British fashtech start-up Petit Pil has come up with an intriguing concept − expanding garments.

Their aim is to break the wasteful cycle of discarding outgrown clothes and buying new ones for kids. The solution is garments that expand up to seven times their original size, thus offering extended use.

The range has also grown (no pun intended) to include adaptive garments for adults, made with monofibre construction and 100% recycled polyester from plastic bottles.

Featuring a fashionable twist on the ordinary paper bag, Sonnet155 is a combination of aesthetics, sustainability and utility by Germany-based designers Johanna Hehemeyer-Cürte and Lobke Beckfeld.

The bag, which features multiple colours, is created from cellulose waste from the textile industry and fruit peels leftover from juice production. Given its biodegradable nature, the bag may also be dissolved in water or “put to rest” in soil at the end of its lifespan.

Guardian lions are typically carved from stone obtained through destructive mining. However, the ones in this exhibit are grown into shape using mycelium (the root system of mushrooms). Grown on agricultural by-product, mycelium has been hailed as the building block of the future − thanks to its ability to turn waste into a useful resource.

The lions are the product of Mycotech Lab, an Indonesia based start-up which explores new possibilities for the application of mycelium. The exhibition’s artwork was also commissioned by Mini Singapore, for eco-cultural trail Mini Extraoddinary 2019.

This ceramic collection is the work of Lithuanian material designer Agne Kucerenkaite. Currently based in the Netherlands, Kucerenkaite works with raw materials and waste to transform them into valuable products, methods and systems.

This exhibit is a prime example, with the pottery’s coloured glazes derived from metals found in industrial mining residues. Kucerenkaite has successfully found a use for the by-product, developing them into colour pigments.

This exhibit showcases fashion items made from Pinatex, a natural textile derieved from pineapple leaves.

According to statistics, an estimated 76 million tonnes of pineapple leaves are wasted by the pineapple industry each year. Here, Pinatex is put to good use by pioneer manufacturer Ananas Anam, which put together the exhibit of shoes and bags.

The company supports local communities by working directly with farming cooperatives, creating an additional revenue stream for Filipino pineapple farmers.

The items in Confetti Rocks are actually the product of designer Genevieve Ang’s (a.k.a. Gellyvieve) clay firing mistakes.

Rather than ditch these “failed” pieces, Ang has chosen to grind them to make grog (a raw material for creating ceramics). She then incorporates the granular material into new works, creating a confetti-like texture in the process.

The result? Quirky and playful works of art that double as homeware.