Circularity 'Pegboard' for Designers (🔧 WiP)

Learn by building, build by learning as an aspiring circular designer

This is an interactive and visual board to ‘finally’ structure my understanding of circularity and to continuously document the learning.

Circularity has been a recurring theme in my work and field of interest. There’s an intrinsic curiosity about where things come from and where they go. As knowledge accumulates—or rather, scatters—I'm constantly seeking ways to structure new insights and strengthen existing connections.

Challenges.

One episode of The Circular Economy Show Podcast mentioned that there are 300+ definitions of Circular Economy in empirical study. It’s an emerging yet deeply complex topic, often diluted by overuse and potentially greenwashing. Below are three challenges:


  • [1] Intangible information overload. There is an overwhelming amount of books, frameworks, terminologies, initiatives and types of reports involved, raising the bar very high for people of interest (designers of interest).

  • [2] Lack of source of truth, or just ‘what is the truth?’. While there are many credible and frequently referred sources, knowledge is often coupled with limitations and surrounded by philosophical debates. Truth itself can be elusive.

  • [3] Hard to stay positive. Circularity is a long-term vision, making immediate impact difficult to see while leveraging the urgent call-to-action for planetary boundaries. The complexity of navigating through various sources and opinions often leads to learned helplessness.

Results. 🔧

To address these challenges, I developed a high-level scheme that structures circularity from broad concepts, hoping to spark actionable insights:

+ A dual perspective of Knowledge vs. Practice

+ A contrast between 20th and 21st-century economic foundations

+ A zoomed-in approach to ‘embodied economy’ as a potential playground for design

+ Two major guiding frameworks: The Butterfly Diagram containing ‘8R’ principal, alongside The 5 Schools of Thought for circular economy: Cradle to Cradle, Performance Economy, Biomimicry, Industrial Ecology, Regenerative Design.

In response to the challenges mentioned above:

✔ Interconnecting mainstream frameworks and best practices to provide clarity.

✔ Curating key terminology and metrics, focusing on the 20% that drives 80% of understanding.

✔ Highlighting critiques and limitations, ensuring a realistic, nuanced perspective.

✔ Emphasizing the real-world communities and sources of case study hubs.


So, How knowledge savvy is enough for designers?

It is never enough and it’s already enough.

The key is to act, and let curiosity and deadlines lead the way 🫰.


Me

still building it...