From the Junkyard to new pastures
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my name is mahdi
and i run junkyard studio and in my
studio
i take broken items and old stuff
and and stuff that people throw out and
turn it into
stuff that’s usable again lamps interior
design
furniture pieces of art and office and
restaurant
design right now i’m working on apache
which is a new co-working space in
sunnis
for innovation dark where i’m making a
lot of stuff
from different old items including quite
a bit of
old bicycle parts rims and tires and
pedals and entire bicycles as well
these will be put into a co-working
space
and used as a little meeting room
like a tiny little phone room or two
meeting
situation so there will be a table here
and
people can pop in and have a private
second
my my favorite material to work with is
metal
like water heaters jerry cans
fire extinguishers which i’ve made lamps
from in the past and also clocks
i also use seat belts which i make
carpets from pillows and also couches
washing machines for instance they have
a beautiful drum inside which can be
used for a lot of different things
it can be be made into a lamp for
instance
which casts most epic shades around in
the room
or it can be like a bonfire for your
outdoors
it can also be turned into a little
table if it’s one of those that you open
from the top
where i mostly get my material is from
first figuring out what it is i’m going
to be making
then contacting private businesses
mostly
directly businesses that i know would
have this specific item
so a lot of the stuff i make you would
need an entire
studio with a lot of tools to create
but there’s a lot of stuff you can can
make in your own
kitchen or garage the internet is just
flush with videos and articles
showing you how you can you can reuse
your stuff and also
having a conscious relationship and
awareness
to the stuff we buy so the reason i do
what i do
is because i think there are so many
so much stuff that that just goes to
waste
than absolutely have a chance of
getting its life extended reduce reuse
recycle
that’s a good thing to keep in mind so
do you actually need to buy this if you
have bought it
can you reuse it if you’re if you’re
tired of it
do you want to paint it do you want to
turn it into something else
do you want to give it to your neighbor
and just to be more aware of this whole
buying tossing thing that has become
very very normal here
i think upcycling and learning how to
upcycle should be a part of the
educational system
so we can really learn to take care of
this planet from
from early age we need to reduce our
consumption
and when we do consume it’s important to
educate ourselves and figure out what
we’re actually supporting when we’re
buying a specific item
and also can it be upcycled can it be
recycled
is it only made of stuff that cannot
even be reused
then maybe it shouldn’t even be on the
market at this point because we need to
get the level of junk dramatically down
on this planet
that’s for sure