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Telling the

Tales of Trashes

Upcycling designer Kevin Cheung Wai-chun tells stories
of waste materials by turning them into new products.

By Soohyun Kim

mong the myriad of skyscrapers in banks, battery chargers and other similar
Wan Chai, there is a four-story tene- products after graduating from the School
Ament block in blight blue colour, Blue of Design at the Hong Kong Polytechnic
House. Inside the iconic historic building, University.
there is a small two-storey room filled with Yet Cheung saw limited room for crea-
rustic rice cooker bowls and broken umbrel- tivity while working for that company.
las, dimmed with a ceiling light made of dis- “Something was missing throughout
carded bicycle rims. the process of designing for a company,”
Dubbed “the rubbish guy”, resident of the he says, “you just get the parts and draw
unit, Kevin Cheung Wai-chun enjoys doing a beautiful box around it, and we call it
treasure hunt in filthy garbage and wastes. [a] new product.” He also acknowledges
Although he no longer does dumpster diving the short lifespan of products he used for
now, the 32-year-old upcycling product de- designs, as most break down within two
signer collects rubbish as raw materials for his years.
creations. Cheung started studying the practice
of upcycling to pursue creativity with
Turning the rotten into miracles an environmental consciousness. The
Since 2011, Cheung has been working with first product he created was a Boombot-
various kinds of wastes to create new prod- tle, a speaker made from a plastic bottle.
ucts — a practice of upcycling. Upcycling is He made the first two Boombottles and
a process of transforming unwanted materi- joined a friend who sold handmade books
als into new products of better quality. The in a flea market in September 2010. Since
practice is different from recycling because it then he has been creating other upcycling
does not involve the breaking down of materi- products, such as Rice Bell, bicycle bells
als. “When we talk about upcycling, we try to made of discarded rice cookers and Lumi-
preserve the material as it is. We try to turn it rim, a ceiling light created with thrown-
into something else without changing it a lot,” away bicycle rims. His customers can find
says Cheung. these products online and at four offline
Cheung used to be a product designer at a retail outlets.
battery company designing flashlights, power