WASTE CARE

 #Workshop

Partners: Monika Gravagno (workshop expert) 
Supported by Cultuur Eindhoven / Stadslab Eindhoven
Presented in Stadslab during Dutch Design Week. Stadslab Workshop run in January 2025.
(NL)

Waste Care is a material-led design proposal that deals with individual empowerment around the repurposing of household organic waste. It was conceived in the BioLab Design assignment titled Closing Loops.

In short, by segregating and preserving the properties of waste at home, we are able to use them again.

Prototype

The research was conducted for three months, where individual waste was collected and measured every week. This later extended to a communal practice among peers, and the main components of Household organic waste in Eindhoven were recorded.

Understanding recycling in the city and the local waste cycle made us reflect on the power we have as consumers. We implement design as an extra step to improve our relationship with waste starting with our own household. We call it caring.

The outcome is presented in a recipe book with information regarding the five main waste ingredients found through the research and how to adapt them into beauty routine products through a series of DIY steps at home. Waste donors were later rewarded with bottles of vinegar lip balm, or exfoliating scrubs made with their own waste.

Pilot: Waste Care Workshop
Supported by Cultuurfonds Eindhoven and Stadslab Eindhoven.

In a 2-Saturday workshop, we revisited our methodologies and worked with assistants towards understanding the value of household waste. We produced deliverables such as lip balm made from old lemons, fertilizers from vegetable peels, body scrubs from coffee, among others.

Visit the digital archive ☞HERE


We are currently looking to develop this project even further. If you would like to contribute or collaborate, ☞GET IN TOUCH;)

HTBMFF - How Tteokbokki became my favorite food

Partners: Marie Kang (creative director) 
Presented in Chiasm, Sectie C during Dutch Design Week. To be Cooked booth during Dutch Design Week & Limestone Books dedicated Book Launch Event. (NL)

Exploring identity, migration, and cuisine through design

As two social designers with roots in different parts of the world, we were brought together by our shared interest in eating together. Our journey began during our Master’s at Design Academy Eindhoven, where we discovered how homemade meals helped bridge distances—not only between us and our homes, but also between us and each other.

This project explores the kitchen as a cultural interface, using Korean food practices as a case study to examine the intersection of identity, globalization, and accessibility within the Dutch context. Through research and design, we investigate how traditional Korean ingredients are adapted—or substituted—within Eindhoven’s supermarket landscape, and what this tells us about cultural merging in everyday life.

Our process blends ethnographic research with culinary experimentation. We analyzed ingredient availability in both Dutch and Asian supermarkets, studied the significance of key elements in Korean recipes, and developed accessible dishes tailored to life in the Netherlands. The outcome is a bilingual (Dutch/English) illustrated recipe book, designed not just to teach cooking, but to open up a conversation about migration, belonging, and food as a shared language.

The project culminated in October 2024 with two soft launch events: one at Limestone Books in Maastricht, and another during Dutch Design Week in Eindhoven. Both launches featured an interactive installation and a special line of ceramicware designed specifically for the book, bringing the publication to life through touch, taste, and storytelling.

This project is for curious home cooks, and multicultural communities alike—anyone who believes food is more than sustenance; it’s a way to connect, reflect, and belong.

Ask for a hardcover ☞HERE

Crafts of Resistance 

Partners: Neighbourhood of Stratum
Supported by Material Bank DAE 
Presented in Heuvel Gallerie during Design Academy Graduation Show Dutch Design Week (NL)


“Crafts of Resistance draws from the spirit of resilience with which individuals in Lima address adversity by ingeniously refashioning jobs around unexpected services. Similarly, the project explores the idea that scarcity can become a creative propeller, by repetitive making cups based on free materials and social opportunities in the vicinity of the workspace. The form and production of the cups are a gauge of the privileges of the craftsperson in particular contexts. Refusing the status of an object, the cups also become a material to be repurposed and reworked in ways that resist finality. These are some of Daniela’s findings regarding the vast possibilities of artisanal production beyond a Western framework.” - Excerpt for Dutch Design Week 2022.



This being said, I find problem-solving through making to be a powerful methodology. It rises questions of what is really essential, what can be replaced or solved in alternative ways and what is the aesthetic value that we give to objects.

 Ceramics is a discipline that has taught me to design in a process-centered way. I apply it in different contexts, materials and ideas. 

It has also taught me about existing social hierarchies surrounding the material world: colonial power structures of extraction that remain to this day. 



The collection of objects is a reflection of the context where the making took place. I picture that every collection will look different as it consists mainly of what is there at a given time.

Stories Around the Cabinet 

Supported by Material Bank DAE 
Printed in Onomatopee
Presented in Heuvel Gallerie during Design Academy Graduation Show Dutch Design Week (NL)


A reflective thesis exploring the legacies of craft and lineage in the context of Design Academy through the ethnography of an inherited object. The thesis draws on primary research of various types, in particular autoethnography and making, and secondary research that is put into meaningful reflection. 

Drawing from Maggie Nelson’s Bluets, the writing is kept personal and the non-linear structure develops a cohesive argument merging the different points of view together.



The writing is both in Spanish and English, as it deals with topics that are related to Latin America, immigration and colonization. The colors blue and black are used throughout the layout to differentiate the Spanish and the English version. 

In accordance with the topic, the thesis is produced through the risograph workshop at Onomatopee, and assembled through autonomous means at Design Academy Eindhoven.



The cover is recycled paper from the workshop with layered first try-outs. 10 copies were printed altogether. 



Read the digital version ☞HERE



Or order the Riso printed version ☞HERE

C.C.C.Cuisine 

Partners: Pablo Bolumar, Thijmen Peters, Walter Mingledorff, Tin Ayala.
Supported by G.G.z.E
Presented in the lichtorenplein during Design Academy Eindhoven examinations. (NL)

In De Grote Beek health center, people have access to facilities and activities that make them find their way in society. The patients are liberated from the pressure of work and the act of making is an activity of release in their everyday life. This contrasts with a society where work only supports productivity. 

The GGzE could be seen as an ideal scenario where people have the freedom to do what they want focusing on their well-being. 

Could we learn from their way of functioning?



For our research process, we decided to focus on barbecues as a medium to enjoy the process of collective making and to maintain our peace of mind during the project. We wanted to focus on creating a context that enables us to explore ways of collaborative care. 

Every Friday we built a barbecue together. During these days, the act of making was the most important thing, and everyone was involved. At the end of the day, we used these barbecues to share a collective meal, and we documented and reflected upon this. 

We compiled these reflections in a book and held a collective barbecue event during the final examination of Design Academy Eindhoven: our biggest source of mental exhaustion.

The result was a Manifesto booklet presented as documentation for the final design project for G.G.z.E. The booklet gives insights on the methodology process of making and community building taking the example of how clients at G.G.z.E take care of their mental health within the intitutional facilities. 

The booklet was printed and bookbinded by hand at Design Academy Eindhoven.



Look at the complete booklet ☞HERE



The Better Bread

Supported by Dutch Invertuals Academy
Presented in Dutch Invertuals digital exhibition.  


'What makes bread bread?'



With this project I aim to take a closer look at the industrial production of bread, detaching it from the romanticized idea of traditional bread-baking. Throughout the program, I discovered a fascination for transformative processes and working with elements that are out of my control. 



Several bread tests are presented. Its form is sculptural, evoking its closeness to a decorative object. Natural bread, whole wheat. How natural is too much?  Bread with germinating plants is nutritious? Time consuming cultured yeasts that create larger air pockets. Taller breads. A bread enriched with dietary supplements. What supplements can be included? Can a bread last forever? Who decides what is a better bread? 



My local environment is directly related to my work: Moving away from familiarity and trying to adapt my practice to the resources available. As a result, I explore materiality through the kitchen. 



I work with bread. Bread as a social component in society, as the basis for nutrition, as an object. It is a material that comes not from digging into the soil or from mixing chemicals. It is shaped by other forms of life that have lived among us for many, many years. I am interested in transformation processes, where my role is not to make but to work with other elements that are not under my control. 



Visit the online exhibition ☞HERE


Recyclebar

Partners: Daan Overhaag, Teresa Carvalheira, Inga Hamelmann, Ana Robles.
Presented for the Bio Design Challenge 2022. (NL)


Living in the context of a growing demand for biomaterials to contribute to a sustainable means of production, we thought it was important to provide friendlier access to said resources. 



Recyclebar is a project that focuses on returning restaurant waste to circulation for future use. Given the material potential of restaurant discards such as eggshells, seashells, and other property-rich materials, it is possible to rethink how both the food and the sustainable product-making industries can support each other. 



The research was conducted in a singular restaurant in the city of Eindhoven. We analyzed the customer journey of “Cafe Restaurant Eindhoven” through the production of a single dish. Additionally, we weighted, mapped and categorized the organic waste of a dish, day, and week. We outlined the kitchen infrastructure to understand how this could be adapted to function in the same space. 



We propose a system were both food and its residues can be processed, and the latter can become a sellable good as any other. 



A 2min concept video was produced for the Bio Design Challenge 2022. ☞WATCH



Building Dialogue

Partners: Freja Nielsen, Ankit Kumar, Gal Yerushalmi, Rawan Khater, Nawon Koo, Monika Gravagno, Monika Litzinger, Teresa Carvalheira, Inga Hamelmann, Ana Robles.
Presented in Kazerne, Plan B and Design Academy (NL)


Collective-initiated design project intended as a workshop format to open discussions between participants. Presented and adapted to several settings in Eindhoven between 2022 and 2023. 





First edition 

June 2022

Design Academy Eindhoven, Netherlands 


Site and context-specific design project aimed at creating speculative scenarios to engage both design students and mentors to showcase individual skills and collective work during individual-centered examination settings of Design Academy.




Second edition

October 2022 

Plan B x Dutch Design Week - Eindhoven, Netherlands


Site and context-specific design project aimed at engaging with participants of the Dutch Design Week. The “game” was activated on a cafe setting during 2 days and sparked discussions around future dystopian scenarios.




Third edition 

January 2023

MU Space - Eindhoven, Netherlands


Site and context-specific design project developed for a group of visiting students from The Royal College of Arts. Designing scenarios around the topic of motherhood was part of the preparation for this event, held and hosted at a gallery setting.




Fourth Edition

February 2023

Kazerne x Innovation cafe - Eindhoven, Netherlands


This edition was contextualized for a tech and engineering crowd in the “Innovation cafe” event hosted by Kazerne in the center of Eindhoven. 

The scenarios created were around futures regarding the allocation of resources and shifts in the status quo. A heated debate!

Migration 

Partners: Meche Tomotaki, Sachiko Kobayashi, Nori Kobayashi, Tamie Tokuda.
Supported by: Asociación Peruano Japonesa.
Presented in Komorebi Collective Exhibition, Galeria de la Asociación Peruano Japonesa (PE).


Exhibition pieces





Grouper or hata in Japanese can be found in the Pacific Ocean. In Japan, it is used to make sashimi. In Lima, they use it to make dishes like ceviche. If we see the sea not as a void but as a volume, it becomes the territory that connects Peru with Japan. Fish own this space and are a common element between these two very different cultures.



In my case, fish is part of my story. The most memorable memories I have with my maternal grandfather are those that revolve around it. When I was a child, I helped my grandfather stuff a devilfish. He himself would have found a way to do it by hand and at home, and he liked to display them on the countertop in the old store in Paruro, Lima’s old city center. It is also thanks to him that I learned to enjoy sashimi for all the times he showed up at my house with a fresh fish in hand.



I talk about fish, but behind it are all my grandfather's teachings: hard work, dedication, honesty, respect and the importance of family. Our stories are made up of the stories of those who came before us, of memories of foreign and faraway places. Each person, like the leaves in the komorebi¹, reveals different aspects of the same origin.



Migración is an installation of three hata fish. Inspired by my grandfather’s resourcefulness, I explore ceramics with a curious eye. Experimental techniques such as cuts and sections, assembly and Japanese-style repair are used along with traditional Okinawan-inspired patterns. 


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¹ About Komorebi and the Nikkei ² culture:

Komorebi is a japanese word to describe the sun's rays filtering through the leaves of the trees.



It refers to a sensation generated by an effect of nature at a given moment. The three elements involved: the sun, the leaves and the ground participate in the game between light and the cast shadows that we actually see.



If we visualize the sun as the origin of our ancestors and the soil as the land on which we grow, the immigrants would be the leaves that create the play of light and shadow that we see in the komorebi. It is through them that we have learned what we originally know about Japan. Their customs became our customs, sometimes without even us knowing the country they once belonged to. The leaves are that element that stands between the light and the earth, generating an atmosphere so powerful that it is worthy of being named with a word. For me, that particularity describes what it is to be a Nikkei.

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² A term to refer to Japanese descendants born abroad.






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Komorebi Collective Exhibition


Av. Gregorio Escobedo 803, Lima, Perú

1.12.19-27.12.19
       

Press release ☞HERE

New Rituals

Supported by: Asociación Peruano Japonesa. 
Presented in II Salon de Arte Nikkei. Galeria de la Asociación Peruano Japonesa (PE) & Instituto Cervantes Tokyo (JP)


Exhibition pieces




The second edition of the art salon brings together proposals that reflect on identity, art, and technology. As a collective of Peruvian artists of Japanese descent, we engaged in an ongoing dialogue—merging our individual practices with these themes through group feedback and shared exploration, culminating in the final exhibition.

For my part, I chose the teapot as a conceptual anchor, drawing inspiration from the traditional Japanese tea ceremony: a ritual that invites presence and appreciation of the here and now.




 

Adapting the shape of the container to the function of containing and serving was the added proposal since all the pieces are functioning teapots. With this project, I seek to contrast both rituals: those of before and those of now; questioning the existence of that brief enjoyment in our times.




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II Salón de Arte joven Nikkei

19.04.18 - 27.05.28

Galería de Arte Ryoichi Jinnai y Hall de Exposiciones del Centro Cultural Peruano Japonés, Av. Gregorio Escobedo 803, Jesús María

Press release ☞HERE



Read the PDF about the event and exhibition ☞HERE

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Salón de Arte Joven Nikkei

27.07.19-27.08.19

Instituto Cervantes - Tokio / Cervantes Bldg. 2-9 Rokuban-cho, / Tokyo, Japan
      

Press release ☞HERE

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