Remove those roadblocks to upcycling

The brainchild of Sruti Harihara Subramanian, Goli Soda sells upcycled goods and also conducts workshops for weekend upcyclers. Here, Nahshon J. Benjamin from Goli Soda offers three tenets of upcycling.

Tenet 1 : Everyone is bound to have at least one skill that can turn him into an upcycler.

“Do you know how to stitch? If you do, why don’t you consider turning a sari into a doormat or a bag to carry groceries?”

Tenet 2 : Everyone will become an upcycler if he realises it is often cheaper to make something than buy it.

“Even those who many want to buy plastic-free products may baulk at their prohibitive cost. A bamboo-made toothbrush is costlier than the regular plastic toothbrush. The only way around this problem is to make an eco-friendly toothbrush with upcycled products.

Tenet 3:

In the upcycling journey, the first roadblock is the self-induced pressure to produce something intricate.

“The key is to keep it simple and to upcycle what you can. Even old newspapers can be converted into bags. Intricacies develop organically!"