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Lighting design

From discarded umbrellas to desk lamps with waste transformation business ANTI

By using waste objects like building blocks, ANTI is creating beautiful products that have a circular lifestyle.

ANTI is a waste design business that uses objects that usually end up in landfills as building blocks for beautiful product design. Harnessing waste as a free resource, they create products that are genuinely circular in nature, free from animal cruelty, clever and authentic in origin and design.

Unfortunately, most of today’s products are still being manufactured using materials that are harmful to the environment, cannot be recycled easily and end up as waste that cannot biodegrade. ANTI began as a direct response to this, by creating products that have a circular lifecycle, using waste products and turning them into desirable objects for their clients to use, love and cherish. ANTI’s products are also easier to reuse when the time is right, setting an example to an outdated industry.

Their first products are a series of elegant table and desk lamps made from discarded, lost and broken umbrellas.

Find out more about designers using waste to create amazing products, don’t miss Teun Zwets made a funky planter out of his own trash.

Desk lamp by ANTI made from discarded, lost and broken umbrellas

Why umbrellas?

  • One billion umbrellas are broken, lost, discarded each year (worldwide).
  • The nylon canopies may take up to 1,000 years to biodegrade.
  • Umbrellas are not designed to last with an average lifespan of 6 months.
  • Umbrellas create 240,000 tons of metal waste per year. That’s the equivalent amount of metal to build four Sydney Harbour Bridges.

ANTI’s designs are made from a mixture of materials, some upcycled (umbrellas), recycled and biodegradable with only 5% of the product material coming from virgin materials. They also take back products post-use.

Their desk and table lamps are available from £180 on their website.

Curious to know about other products made out of recycled waste? Don’t miss Studio ThusThat’s lamp made from waste products from copper.