Extra circular ↺
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Multipurpose parts are the surprising superpower of super circular design.
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Circular design is a collection of practices that make products truly sustainable. There are 10 and they all start with the letter R → Refuse, Rethink, Reduce, Reuse, Repair, Refurbish, Remanufacture, Repurpose, Recycle, Rot.
Unfortunately, they are rarely used today because the design of our products has to enable them. But today’s dominant design practices are not up to the task. They make these circular practices too difficult, too expensive or even completely impossible.
But when you push and tweak a design to the point where all the circular practices are enabled at the same time, something interesting happens:
Design with open multipurpose parts emerges as an additional quality.
Designing with multipurpose parts suddenly makes all circular practices possible and easy to achieve. Here are these practices and how they are made possible with open multipurpose parts.
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Circular practices & design with open multipurpose parts.
Refuse
Definition source
Make product redundant by abandoning its function or by offering the same function with a radically different product.
Design with open multipurpose parts info
→ Why buy new when you can turn what you already have into what you need right now? Quickly transform your home for a party or overnight guests without buying extra furniture. Hack your home or work place.
Rethink
Definition source
Make product use more intensive (e.g. by sharing product)
Design with open multipurpose parts info
→ Turn products into transformable objects. Use the same collection of parts to solve different problems. And make this accessible to everyone, not just professionals. Turn customers into co-designers. This is different.
Reduce
Definition source
Increase efficiency in product manufacture or use by consuming fewer natural resources and materials
Design with open multipurpose parts info
→ See above under Rethink: “Turn products into transformable objects. Use the same collection of parts to solve different problems.” And now buy less.
Reuse
Definition source
Reuse by another consumer of discarded product which is still in good condition and fulfills its original function
Design with open multipurpose parts info
→ See above plus: Design with multipurpose parts is perfect for second-hand markets. Your sofa is not just a sofa, but a collection of parts to build all sorts of things. Someone might buy your sofa because they need a sofa. Another might buy your sofa because they want two armchairs and your sofa is the perfect parts dispenser for them.
Repair
Definition source
Repair and maintenance of fefective product so it can be used with its original function
Design with open multipurpose parts info
→ Ideally, design with multipurpose parts consists of parts that are easy to make, open and well documented and a product is easy to disassemble and reassemble. This makes repair possible. If the broken part is a very popular and widely used part – because it is super universal – it will also be easy to find an existing replacement on the market.
Refurbish
Definition source
Restore an old product and bring it up to date
Design with open multipurpose parts info
→ Design with multipurpose parts has designed products that can be taken apart, updated and put back together again. There are new parts that give your products additional features? Just add them.
Or after disassembly: Individual parts can be cleaned and reused – at an industrial level. Universal parts have a shorter shelf-life. Many possibilities are calling.
Remanufacture
Definition source
Use parts of discarded product in new product with same function
Design with open multipurpose parts info
→ Design with multipurpose parts transforms products into easily accessible and well documented parts collection points. It’s hard to imagine a design that better supports remanufacturing.
Repurpose
Definition source
Use discarded product or its parts in a new product with a different function
Design with open multipurpose parts info
→ This is the beating heart of design with multipurpose parts! And it accelerates it with its collaborative approach. Together we can creatively expand the catalog of available repurposing options. Your products become more transformable over time!
Recycle
Definition source
Process materials to obtain the same (high grade) or lower (low grade) quality
Design with open multipurpose parts info
→ Design with multipurpose parts makes products that are easy to disassemble. You can separate the parts and therefore – if the parts are made of only one material – you can separate the materials more easily. The difficulty of separating materials is often the biggest barrier to recycling. If you think about the tolerance idea (see “DWMP strives to be easy to produce” ↑) – you can choose recycled materials from the start and/or use materials that are easy to recycle.
Rot
Definition
Rot is natures way of recycling
Design with open multipurpose parts info
→ The answer is basically the same as for recycling: Design with multipurpose parts makes products that are easy to disassemble. You can separate the compostable parts for composting. If you think about the tolerance idea (see “Design with multipurpose parts strives to be easy to produce” ↑) – you can choose materials that are compostable from the start, if you have access to them.
Illustration by Cailin O’Reilly
Why is design today usually not up for the tasks of circularity?
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click to open explanation
We’ll add more info here soon.
But with a little thought, you can largely answer the question for yourself.
Look around the room you’re in at the moment. How are most of the things in it designed? They probably follow our current design paradigm. And that means:
The designers have focussed on unusual materials and unusual shapes. Every component was designed exclusively for this one product and only works here. They then tried to save costs during production. The parts may have been glued together or are otherwise difficult to separate. You won’t find any conclusive documentation for the products and the parts used in them anywhere. Unless you have special reverse engineering skills, it is difficult to find out what is installed here. It’s a black box. Filled with unclear components and ideas.
And now try to take this product on a journey through the 10 practices above. How does this hero face these challenges? You will quickly find that this hero fails almost everywhere. He can’t do it.
The design of this hero drives up the costs of most circular practices to such an extent that they become uneconomical. Products made from open multipurpose parts accommodate these practices, making them significantly easier and therefore perhaps more economical.
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We have written a little more about this in our mission statement ⤤ and in the first point of our white paper ‘Design With Multipurpose Parts’ → Design with multipurpose parts is something a real designer can’t do ⤤.