From the Himalayas
Every year, Dutch Design Awards (DDA) honours the best Dutch designers and their most impressive and groundbreaking projects. Various disciplines, viewpoints and solutions are judged in light of the impact they have on our society. Dutch Design Awards thereby gives a boost to the profession as a whole. The best Dutch design, viewed in perspective and placed on a pedestal.
DDA nomination 2023 | Product
The Sagarmatha National Park in Nepal is the home of Mount Everest and attracts over eighty thousand visitors every year. This leads to tragic amounts of waste and puts pressure on the vulnerable ecosystem. Super Local and Sagarmatha Next are working together on the ‘Carry me back’ system. It involves local residents and tourists in the region carrying tons of waste back to Kathmandu, where it is recycled. Super Local processes water bottle caps into the ‘From the Himalayas’ collection: three pebble-shaped plastic stones and a scale model of Himalayan peaks. A perfect memento for tourists, with which they can continue to express their environmental responsibility at home. The proceeds finance the workshop and staff that form the foundations of this project.
Expert jury
This project is all about awareness: being allowed to climb Mount Everest goes hand-in-hand with a responsibility to clean up the waste that gets left behind. Super Local has designed a complete project in From the Himalayas. The design of the product is well-considered. The pebbles refer to waste and the value of recycling – from trash to treasure – and provide a recognisable representation of the place in question. The ultimate souvenir, with a primarily symbolic value. The designers have chosen to take a positive viewpoint, instead of a punitive one, as is done elsewhere through issuing fines. The social context and the process form the starting point and are characteristic of Super Local’s design projects.
For more information about the nominees and the DDA Awards Show you can visit dutchdesignawards.nl.