Day 10-13 Tea, Bamboo, Wood

We trekked into our jam packed adventure on a charter bus stopping by Yoshan Tea Culture Museum, Yuan Tai bamboo factory, Chen's wood shop, and finally the extremely well designed Star Hostel featuring circular economy focused home goods by Homework. The following day we visited another bamboo factory that focused on weaving and a restaurant that focused on sourcing all its food and ingredients locally.

Tea

I personally really love tea, especially Taiwanese tea and oolong teas, so the visit to the tea museum was particularly interesting. We learned about the tea making process and had the chance to try a variety of Taiwanese oolong teas. One that stood out was called Oriental Beauty (Dong Fang Mei Ren) which is made with the buds that have been fed on by tea green leaf hoppers. The name apparently came from the Queen of England who was also fascinated by this tea. 

Bamboo

At the Yuan Tai bamboo factory, we learned about the process of cutting the bamboo into sections, smoothing, spray painting, and transforming the pieces into cups. The company originally produced knitting needles but the market for that has since dwindled, so the business model has now expanded into making other goods including toothbrushed, cups, and bowls. We took a visit to a second bamboo factory where we participated in a bamboo weaving workshop creating a woven plant vase. I think we unanimously agreed that bamboo weaving is more difficult than it looks. I had a newfound admiration for the craft and the intricately woven patterns of bamboo goods I have seen on this trip so far and in the past.

Wood

Chen's wood shop has been in the family for three generations. The shop creates sign boards for businesses, toys, plates, hair pins, and various other hand-carved goods. They also explained that they have evolved their designs over the years to meet the market as society evolves. It was nice to see that this tiny shop was going strong in its society. They also offer classes and apprenticeships which is a great way to spread crafting knowledge. I think this is important to disrupting overconsumption and keeping craftsmanship alive.

Sustainable Design in Action

During our tour of Star Hostel, it was mentioned that circular economy was particularly important for Taiwan because they needed to become self sufficient in the case that they can no longer rely on foreign trade. Permaculture, an approach to design that adopts arrangements observed in flourishing natural ecosystems, was a key tenet to the design of the hostel. I was impressed by the locally sourced materials many plants that were incorporated into the interior design. This unique hostel had a East Asian cultural feel, with its minimalistic design, area to remove and store shoes with house slippers provided at the entrance, bamboo furniture, and Japanese style floor tables. The design choices definitely achieved their goal of making me feel very comfortable and relaxed during my stay.

We also visited a restaurant that emphasized sourcing local foods and ingredients for all of their dishes. The place emanated a very homey ambiance, walls decorated with products from local artisan goods including natural sponges, coffee beans, barley, bamboo chopsticks, sugar cane straws, guide books on Taiwanese seafood, and more. The food was also very tasty.

I have enjoyed the visits to various craft sites and the theme of circular economy. It makes me think that we need to genuinely overhaul the consumerist system in order to make any significant strides towards a more circular economy. This just shows the complexity of this wicked problem. How might we as designers facilitate this shift?