Student Work

Inspiration [1] My main focus for this upcycle project was to build something useful that adds a beautiful touch to my kitchen. I really enjoy cooking and having an organized kitchen is really important to me. Therefore, I started to look at different upcycle projects and I was inspired by the amazing design shown in…

Material For my upcycling project, I chose to work with old clothes that I had laying around my closet. I’m used to painting of canvases, therefore using fabric as building unit was difficult specially having a limited color palette. I chose to use a Styrofoam board as a base to attach all the fabric on.…

For my up-cycle project I made a 50s style dress out of paper. Here is the final product. Inspiration: The reason I wanted to make this dress is because I am attending a Time Travelers Ball in mid February. Last time I went as someone from the future so this time I want to be…

For my upcycle project I decided to create something for my Dad that he could keep forever and that would add to his bar aesthetic. While traveling through Europe for my study abroad experience I visited many, many bars and got to experience the different drinking styles of these countries. I found that many drink…

This is the final product. The image above is the aesthetic I chose to create and is a draw string t-shirt. Below I will go over the process of creation. First… Gather shoe lace and shirt. Second… Cut shoe lace in half. Third… Cut hole in the middle of the shirt. Fourth… Put safety pin…

For my final product I made upcycled porcelain jewelry from a mug I had recently broken. They happened to be about the right size that I wanted for a necklace and an earring. To create the holes I wanted to use a hand drill, and sand paper to smooth out the edges and get the…

Here’s my final design for the upcycle project, an LED lamp made from laser cut sections of wood veneer. The earlier stages of my design process are documented on previous blogs, so I’ll pick up where the last one left off. I went to assemble the paper prototype that I made, and quickly realized that…

My upcycling project was made both to fulfill the assignment requirement of this class and to be a part of a personal project I have. I created a switch panel for mounting multiple toggle switches. The switch panel is intended to be installed on a wall. If you read my previous upcycle project design process…

My aesthetic is something that I am defining as Chaotic. There is hardly order in the structure of what visually makes up this lampshade. What you see on the outside are pointed leaves of multicolored paper shrouding the light in a way that has no pattern. Light is able to peek through at random spots…

Vision and Inspiration  For my upcycle project, I decided to make a wine rack. My inspiration came form the Industrial aesthetic. I really liked how in the aesthetic, there were aspects of an unfinished look, neutral colors, weathered wood and steel. I then started exploring furniture/decorations within the industrial aesthetic. What stuck out to me…

Utilization of pennies in an art installation can be extremely pleasing due to the varying colors of copper and the shape of the penny. When used in a linear pattern placement like the final product, they can create wonderful designs. As discussed in the video presentation, the final design was chosen to look like a…

For my project I wanted to create something that would be useful in my everyday life while still conforming to my personal style. I didn’t just want some more clutter that I would eventually throw away. I wanted something that would show who I am and what my interests are. credit: www.autoayudalibros.com/ credit: asctowing.info/industrial-bathroom-design/  credit:…

For this project I decided to decorate glass bottles and use them as flower vases. based on my first post, my design process started by brain storming and looking for appealing ideas. The first challenge I face was to find the materials for the ideas I liked. After a lot of thinking and brainstorming, I…

The process of this project began with the researching the aesthetic of the mosaic. Which traces its roots back to the ancient world, such as in Greece, capturing the stories from their mythology. [1] Poseidon From ancient Greece, the style was continued on throughout the Roman empire, eventually finding its way into several different religious…

The final product Preliminary Design and Inspiration For this particular project, I wanted to focus exclusively on the aesthetics of my final product. I had no particular inspiration for what I wanted to do, but I did know what materials I planned on using. In addition, I wanted to incorporate a handful of different aesthetics, those being…

For my up cycle project I chose to make a desk lamp centered around a power line insulator. An image of the final product is included below As stated in the title, my main inspiration for the project was to use a power line insulator in a novel way. Due to my grandfather amassing a…

To begin this project I thought about which material I wanted to use. I wanted something that gave me a lot room for creativity and didn’t push me into a certain style. I also thought about what functionality do I want to get out of this project and not make something that has no purpose…

Utility. Function. Upcycling for the sake of preserving the planet. My project has nearly none of those qualities. What little utility it has is eliminated as soon as you use it. Its function is better served with an app on a smartphone, and while it is upcycled, it is manufactured in such a way that…

I have been a LEGO fan since I was child. After experiencing various type of LEGO, IDEAS series becomes my favourite. LEGO® Ideas products have been inspired and voted for by LEGO fans. They include original concepts and sets inspired by films! Recently I found there was a new IDAES product released to public –…

Link to my presentation slides: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1DM0aey_1q6RIds068RZOfYfKH4jdVQJKWEgBVGR2gP8/edit?usp=sharing Link to my video presentation : https://youtu.be/V3vBUwSVPpM                For my Upcycling project I decided to start the design process by first picking the materials. I had to carboard tubes about to be recycled thus I decided to use those. Then I saved a box I had laying around as…

The URL for my 9min. presentation is.. My overall purpose for this project was to create something that could meet the requirements of this class, but be used in my daily life. I don’t feel like we should upcycle something only to trash it. As a result, I looked around my life at the things…

For my upcycle project I created a lamp with a spiral cardboard base and a floral, coffee filter lampshade. The base was made of a repeating shape that spiraled upward. Each piece was glued together with tacky glue. Shown below the individual pieces are shown and also in-progress pictures of the base being glued together.…

I love most kind of games and I’m addicted to any kind of board game. I started playing board games since I was 3 years old. I play with my friends, siblings, my parents, and my husband. I’m competitive in a good way ( I guess ) and it helped me to be creative. I…

https://www.wayfair.com/outdoor/sb1/square-fire-pits-c215964-a144382~459808.html https://www.benrothdesign.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/custom-fire-pit.jpg I got my inspiration from all the time I spent this summer around the fire with my friends, and my general affinity for fires. After looking at all the circular designs online, and realizing it would be impossible to print these shapes, I stumbled upon some square fire put designs that could easily…

I have kept the switch panel project idea mentioned in my previous post. I am going to make it out of an old piece of HVAC duct. The duct sheet metal is perfect for the project because it is thin enough to be crafted using hand tools, but rigid enough for the final product to…

Inspiration: The inspiration for my upcycle project was born from necessity and the materials I had available to me. I originally knew that I wanted to turn this assignment into a project that I could use in my daily life. With this thought in mind, I decided I wanted to make a piece of furniture,…

The inspiration of my upcycle project was from the Japanese anime The Disastrous Life of Saiki K, which was a very funny anime. The main character Saiki has a pretty interesting appearance. The most eye catching feature of him is the two devices on his head. I think it’d be fun to recreate this specific…

Though this upcycle project wasn’t intended to create something functional, I wanted to use it as a challenge to apply an aesthetic to what I want to create for my final project in this class, a beer tap handle. Initially, I was inspired by some posts I’ve seen online of people using their failed 3D…

Materials The first step in my upcycle project was picking out what materials I would use. After looking around my house, I gathered some cardboard, plywood sheets, twine and a couple of mason jars. After looking at past upcyclying projects for the class I decided that I did not want to use wine or beer…

Project Background Kintsugi is a pottery technique that glorifies imperfection and embraces the cracks that bring us together. The art-form dates back to the Japanese shogun Ashikaga Yoshimasa, who sent sent a piece of pottery back to China to be repaired. After the piece return, lackluster held together with only staples, he decided to have…

My project has gone through many iterations in an attempt to stick with the purpose of reuse. My idea has centralized around using a wine bottle since I go through many of those and have many sitting around my house. Originally, I was set on making a wine bottle wind chime. This wind chime was…

The feature this Monday (2.11) will be Modern Times, a look into the chaos of modern life (as of 1936). Credit – International News Photos [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons This film is a silent comedy, it is in black and white, and it features ridiculous machinery that would never actually appear in an industrial…

For this project, we were instructed to take a material that would be thrown out and “upcycle” it into an artifact. This project was an opportunity to take my love for reusing materials and apply it in a more structured way than I ever have. Beginning the process of brainstorming was a little difficult. The…

The inspiration for my upcycle project initially came from the night sky. I have always found the sky to be very aesthetically pleasing and love the way the stars look against the dark sky. I knew from the very beginning this was something I wanted to incorporate into my project. After thinking about a couple…

The story of how I found my inspiration for this upcycle project is actually kind of ironic. As I was looking around my room for something “repetitive” as mentioned in many upcycle projects, I realized that my room was not very decorated. I did not have a clock, paintings, or anything hanging on my walls.…

Today we went over Upcycle Presentation logistics (look for a separate post on that), and then continued with sketching practice, specifically cubes, extending to a blocky chair. In contrast, we also started talking about Universal Principles of Design; specifically Contour Bias. Humans react to pointy things with fear and attention, while rounder objects are more…

The core of the inspiration for my project comes from my own desire to create sculptural objects that serve a utility but are not ideal for that utility. Their sculptural forms are the largest consideration, but they inform the utility as well. Photo Credit: Tyler de Perrot The utility is better served with something similar…

I have been struggling a lot with coming up with what I will make for this project, or what I will use for it, and I think I have finally decided on making some sort of lamp out of different materials, and maybe trying to mess around with how they emit light to create part…

My inspiration came from necessity. I simply was in need for a drawer and this project helped me make one with minimum cost. I already have the functionality of my project done. however, I am still working on the aesthetic part. I have three sides that can use some aesthetic design, and if anyone have…

As mentioned in my previous post, a lot of my inspiration is the rough design sketches of the ideation phase of product development. With toothpicks in mind as a material, it seemed like a perfect way to represent the rough line-based style with stray lines and hashmark shading in a 3D object. I then thought…

Contributors include: Joseph Coulombe, Andres Esteve Our group received snowblower and tiny homes as our aesthetic. At first it was challenging but we soon figured out how we wanted to create our designs.

When I first began my project I wanted something functional, unconventional, and themed around skulls. One, because I want to you this item after this project finishes, two, because I wanted it to be different, and three, I like skulls which is why my first post was on Calaveras. Thinking further I had gotten a…

Last class we created drawings based off given ideas. My team and I worked on creating a drawing that included minimalism and an electric toothbrush. As seen in the image above, I focused on creating the toothbrush while simplifying the overall design. For my upcycle project I will incorporate plastic trash, cardboard, and other resources…

One of the first elements of the project that I considered during the design process was material. It is an up-cycle project after all and the main idea here is to create art out of recycle or old materials. For this reason, one of my first instincts was to think about aluminum cans because they…

This Design came from the combination of a 50’s Car and an umbrella Stand. This specific design was created by Peilin Yang. Currved windshield, Large tailins and the Space Age look of the exhaust pipe indicates the dawning of the Space Age and Space Race in 50’s American. My team/authors: Peilin Yang; Hans Crone; Hogan…

Blur Bear outside the Colorado Convention Center. (Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite) My upcycle project was firstly inspired by Lawrence Argent’s art work–“I See What You Mean”, also known as the “Big Blue Bear”. I first knew it when attending a acadmic conference in Colorado Convention Center in 2017. Spotted leaning its paws against building facade embodies…

In the beginning of January I was on a trip to Washington DC, while there I had the opportunity to visit the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. Contained within the walls of this building were a lot of beautiful pieces of art, astounding architecture, and amazing mosaics. Such as the mosaics…

When I first began brainstorming ideas for this project, I drew a lot of inspiration from saved posts on my Instagram account. I follow several product design accounts and I am frequently saving posts which I find visually appealing. I stumbled across the works of Associated Architects Beyond Borders work with a very fluid and…

After making a pattern of lids last week, I had cemented an image of a sort -of chandelier of repeated circles. Prof. Hertzberg and I have been preparing for an educational demo of flow visualization for the Expanding Your Horizons event, tailored to creative preteens. This will be the second time that I put on…

This week has been hands on for me, I have been making my upcycling project but I don’t know the meaning of it just yet. I built a cardboard frame and I am filling the sides with cut up cardboard tubes. In total I used about a quarter of my latest amazon order box, four…

I covered most of what inspired me to move forward with this idea for my upcycle project in my last post, so I will recap that in this post. Essentially, I wanted to create a project that was based on something we throw away very often, especially here in Boulder. So immediately, I thought of…

For my upcycle project, I wanted to make use of a broken bluetooth speaker and make a landscape on top of it. My inspiration behind this project is when I kept seeing those miniature cities in movies, and I always wondered how cool they are on a large, 3-D scale. nb My original intent for…

My first encounter with kintsugi was through a creator’s video on the subject matter. Nerdwriter1 is an amazing Youtube creator and storyteller who’s deep dive makes for ultra-interesting content. The video below gives the background on the origin of the aesthetic along with some great visuals and some deeper thought into the method. Mending the…

In my last post, I mostly explained what a zoetrope is and briefly about why I chose the zoetrope over my other up-cycle project ideas. In this post I would like to document the process I went through to build the zoetrope. The reason I chose the zoetrope was due to my fascination of our…

The inspiration for my upcycle project was born from necessity and the materials I had available to me. I originally knew that I wanted to turn this assignment into a project that I could use in my daily life. With this thought in mind, I decided I wanted to make a piece of furniture, either…

CAD Model of Jakaroo Board Game I love most kind of games and I’m addicted to any kind of board game. I started playing board games since I was 3 years old. I play with my friends, siblings, my parents, and my husband. I’m competitive in a good way ( I guess ) and it…

[1] My main focus for this upcycle project was to build something useful that adds a beautiful touch to my kitchen. I really enjoy cooking and having an organized kitchen is really important to me. Therefore, I started to look at different upcycle projects and I was inspired by the amazing design shown in the…

The inspiration for my project came mostly from the materials I had. It is interesting to think back on the project because I never really had that “ah ha!” moment when searching for ideas. I knew which materials I wanted to use and my inspiration more or less came from there. I then researched industrial…

For my up-cycle project, I’m making a I was inspired by lots of different examples of parametric design I had seen on the internet, but this light fixture designed by a studio called Path caught my eye. It looked like a technique I could replicate with my own design, and I could easily incorporate my…

I was inspired by many kinds of aesthetics that I saw as I was growing up in California. Because of the touristy nature of California in general, I saw many types of “Beachy art”. These types of art pieces often incorporated shells of some type as well as different types of seaglass and driftwood. These…

My inspiration from my brainstorming process. I thought about what I do and what I need for that. My biggest hobby is cooking so I thought what do I need for that. And I always wanted a glove that can quickly wear on and off and keep my fingers safe from knife and spices because…

With this upcycling project I had no specific inspirations, in terms of what motivated me to chose this sculpture topic and style, other than the constraints of the materials I had available to me, and some discussions with friends about what I could do with said materials. However, as I’ve progressed with the construction of…