In one of the most prestigious design universities in the world, right at the entrance - The Street - you will be able to catch a glimpse of the Airstream, home to our first circular material hub: the Swap Shop.
What is the Swap Shop?
The Swap Shop is an initiative conceived by the Climate Emergency Network and UAL students and technicians, originally set to facilitate material swapping between students and staff and now powered by Renée Materials.
Today the Swap Shop is a space dedicated to unwanted or unused materials that can be creatively re-used and re-purposed. The system helps UAL’s community save money whilst reinforcing an important message about the difference between “end-of-use" and “end-of-life".
How does it work?
Students can come to the Swap Shop and either drop off, pick up or borrow displayed materials.
All the materials have been either donated by the University’s workshops, facilities, staff and students or by external companies or organizations that are part of Renée’s network.
Once the right material has been found, students check out with staff and register the material’s main information (such as weight and description). This helps UAL keep a critical archive on the Swap Shop’s materials, while measuring its impact.
Students are always asked to follow up with the Swap Shop through pictures of the material’s transformations. This helps the material hub keep up with the item's life and students shift their perception around waste and free resources, whilst enabling more circular behaviours in the creative field. All the offcuts, or the finished product, if unneeded, can be brought back to the Swap Shop, ready to be creatively reused by someone else.
