From Earth

First shown at the 2021 Biennale Architettura in Venice, Refuge for Resurgence is an installation showing a banquet at which equal seating values are given to different species, including ones often considered “vermin”, imagining a future where all animals are equal. It was created by London-based design studio Superflux using a tactile range of natural objects – branches, logs, twigs, moss – alongside repurposed human discards such as cracked plates, harmoniously bringing together the subtle hues and varied textures of nature with re-worked human artefacts.

Regenerative designer, craftsman and environmentalist Sebastian Cox makes bespoke furniture from a nature-first perspective. His pieces are created from locally sourced wood, including his own ancient woodland, and he gives each item a carbon value based on the amount of carbon emitted in the making (from transport to electricity used) and the carbon naturally held in the wood. 

The interconnection between the natural world and material culture is a central theme at Wax Atelier. The studio was founded in 2017 by design duo Lola Lely and Yesenia Thibault-Picazo, and has social enterprise and sustainability at its core. It produces colourful, slowly made, hand-dipped beeswax candles (some in orange, some in seaweed green and more), alongside waxed paper and waxed linen food wraps dyed with flower heads, roots and wood bark.

Aliki van der Kruijs works in collaboration with environmental scientists, and allows natural forces such as rain, sun, heat, and salt to dictate the results of her design projects. Tackling the issue of dye sustainability, her Afterseason initiative repurposes conventional chemically based ink. Treating waste ink using fungi and sugar not only neutralises its harmful elements, but also creates an environmentally friendly new hue. A purple ink van der Kruijs experimented with broke down into a new dye in a delicate shade of green.