For my upcycling project, I intended to create a piece that follows a pastoral aesthetic. This aesthetic is essentially meant to capture the feeling of springtime with softer colors and the portrayal of green fields during sunny days. My main inspiration for the palette of my piece was this photo that I found on the…

This project was an absolute learning experience for me. I started with a cool idea and ended up with something not quite what I intended. So for those of you who haven’t read my previous post, this was my initial idea: Initially, I planned on having a terrarium in a tesseract enclosure made of wooden…

My first inspiration for this project came from the material itself. Since the goal of this project is to upcycle, I started by thinking about sources of waste in my life. This led me to want to base my project around bike tubes. I was also inspired by the fact that I don’t own a…

For my upcycle project I wanted to take an old pair of converse shoes and embroider them with flowers in addition to some other shapes. I had never embroidered before so this project was a bit outside of my skillset and took a bit of trial and error to get good at. It took a…

Disclaimer: As of this posting, this project is not done, as I hurt my wrist and had to slow down in order to prevent further injury, but I intend to continue with this project until I am finished.  For this project, I challenged myself to only use upcycled materials or items I already owned. This…

My inspiration for this project came from my love of music and retro styles, as well as my desire to implement nature and greenery into everyday objects and environments. I began creating my artifact by sketching concepts of what I wanted to produce and speaking with staff at the manufacturing resources around campus to determine…

For my Upcycle project, I decided to make a collection of items with rustic aesthetics out of wine bottles. This aesthetic I was trying to achieve feeds off the scored and broken glass edges of the glass cut and the natural tones of the bottle colors. The final products can be seen in the two images…

I have always found it fascinating the way trends seem to come in and out of fashion. The return of tie dye, short shorts and vans from the 80s, baggy graphic t-shirts and small sunglasses from the 90s, and most recently, I have noticed a huge resurgence of Y2K fashion trends, including the return of…

Background and Inspiration: My inspiration for this project was the many tensegrity tables others have built. I have come across many of these like the ones below, many use wood but some metal for the surfaces, and rope, chains, or rubber bands can make up the tension strings to uphold the upper half of the…

I work as a mountain guide part time on the weekends, which means I have a fair amount of gear to maintain and catalogue. I live in a small space, and need to be really efficient with my space, so I want to better organize my gear closet. Currently, I just have a handful of…

For my Upcycle Project I created a jewelry holder out of cardboard in the shape of a ferris wheel. The jewelry holder spins to simulate a ferris wheel. I based the aesthetic of my ferris wheel off of two vintage wood post cards I have. These two postcards are the inspiration for the colors I…

Braided wire art is a form of artistic expression in which wires are twisted, woven or braided to create intricate patterns and shapes. This type of art is often used to create jewellery, sculptures, and decorative items. Braided wire art can be created using a variety of different wire materials such as copper, silver, and…

Upcycle Turner’s Cube Desk Toy Alex Kelling Desk Toy Aesthetic Desk toys are small, fun little objects to tinker or fidget with as well as having a visually appealing look. They sit on the desk to add personality and distinction to the office work who occupies it. A Google image search reveals what define the…

As I talked about in my last post, for my artifact, I chose to create a bird from a variety of recycled materials. This idea was inspired by several different artists who have done similar things using scrap metal and other materials. I began my project by researching and sketching different kinds of birds and…

My project was most definitely a learning experience. The final knot was not as pretty as I wanted it to look like, and was a little messy looking but overall, but I do like it. As can be seen in the pictures above and below, the knot does look loose and messy compared to the…

After a month’s time, which included ideation, sketching, collection, and fabrication, my upcycling final product is complete. My design is a double-decker plant potter that conforms to the 35mm photo collage aesthetic.  Inspiration My journey began with the exploration of a specific aesthetic. For this I chose, what I deemed, the “BRTHR aesthetic”. BRTHR is…

As this upcycling project started, I began to wonder what I could do to develop my architectural skills. With a fascination for residential homes and contemporary design, a small-scale model seemed like the emerging leader for my design process. While I did know I wanted to create a house, I had yet to know if…

For my upcycling project, I designed a cat house with a 70’s theme. I am also gifting my project to my coworker, who was looking to purchase a cat house! The 70’s era was very funky and groovy, filled with warm colors and overall happiness. This was an aesthetic that really stood out to me,…

https://www.aesdes.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/video1728211881.mp4 If you have any questions that weren’t answered please comment them below!

I chose a headphone stand for my upcycle project as a way to improve my carpentry skills and to create a functional piece of art for my workspace. Source: https://www.wayfair.com/17-Stories–Daiah-Ergonomic-Curved-Height-Adjustable-Standing-Desk I decided to choose minimalism as my inspiration, which led me to make my design fit into my workspace functionally and discretely. Also because of…

Scope and Purpose: The goal of this project was to use upcycled materials to create a fanny pack-style bag in a Gorpcore design aesthetic. Background: Gorpcore is a fashion trend that combines the elements of outdoor clothing with streetwear and fashion. The aesthetic is typically comprised of versatile, functional, and durable clothing items such as…

Intro and Inspirations: I had a hard time initially coming up with a project I wanted to upcycle. I was thinking I would use scrap metal and other similar materials for my project. At some point during the project I remembered my brother had this decommissioned grenade which was made to look like a fly…

For my upcycling design project, I chose to recreate a Xatu Pokémon only using recycled cans as my resource. The final product is shown in the featured image and below. The original aesthetic I was going for was low poly, however there were a few complications. One of them was that low poly uses only…

I have always wanted to make a Japanese boro style denim tapestry, so I thought this project would be the perfect opportunity as it is an upcycle. These kinds of tapestries were created by peasants in Japan during the early 1800s. As items became worn they would get repaired with mismatching fabrics due to a…

The construction of the biophilic violin picture frame was very successful. There are more design elements that will be added in the future; however, due to the constraints of the due date, I was not able to implement all of them The process shifted since the last post into a 4-step construction process Step 1:…

After researching Dadaism for the Aesthetic Exploration post, I became inspired by one of the artists I found; Dash Snow. I really liked the way he arranged his collages and how some of the themes he created were easily identifiable. (1) The End of Living and the Beginning of Survival, Dash Snow, 2008. (2) Moran…

Beer Can Bird Sculpture A contemporary sculpture by Nicolas Garzione Aesthetic Choice Contemporary sculpture is a broad category of art that falls under both modern sculpture and contemporary art. Contemporary art simply describes art made after the second half of the 20th century. I could not find an exact description for the aesthetic I had…