Projects

Since 2010 Rekindle has evolved more than 10 different projects that have all focused on resourcefulness; some small, some as big as Whole House Reuse and our Necessary Traditions festival.This work has been made possible by a large number of people who have worked together to find greater resourcefulness.

Rekindle work includes:

2010   Rekindle first begun whilst based in Auckland.
2011   First waste-wood furniture prototypes & commissions completed.
2012-2015   Moved back to Ōtautahi Christchurch. Set-up furniture workshop & developed salvage process in post-earthquake red-zone where demolition was fast, wasteful and happening at scale. Made & sold a range of furniture & offcut products, this link tells the whole story of this first major project.

2012-2015   Set-up Rekindle Studio in collaboration with Shop Eight, & Rekindle shop.

2012-2015   Whole House Reuse project instigated, stalled, instigated, stalled, instigated, nearly stalled & then completed. Whole House Reuse book published. 

2014   Auckland Design Series & Waterfront Pop-Up completed.

2016-2017   Resource: Rise Again project completed. Five professional design teams focused their skills on commercial waste in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland, Pōneke Wellington and Whangarei.

2016    Zero Waste Ōtautahi event at FESTA.

Support provided in Kaikōura for post-EQ waste minimisation.

2017 Launch of Resourceful Ōtautahi with opening of workshop at Ferrymead Heritage Park, and an inner city Resourceful Skills Workshop Pop-Up.

2018 March - Published first volume of the Journal of Resourcefulness.

2018 April/May - Lincoln University Oak project completed with many new craftspeople making stools and spoons from timber felled onsite.

2018 June - Relocated workshop to the Te Matatiki Toi Ora Arts Centre in central Ōtautahi Christchurch city.

2018 November - the inaugural Necessary Traditions festival at the Arts Centre, where over 40 resourceful craft practitioners shared their skills & practice.

2018 December - commenced Resourceful Ōtautahi Walking Tours via a partnership with Planeterra & G Adventures. This gave visitors to Ōtautahi Christchurch an experience of resourcefulness told through the history of Rekindle's work & examples of other resourceful aspects of the rebuilding city.

2019 November - Waiata ki te wai/Songs for water. This was part of Yo-Yo Ma’s Bach Project, which explored how culture actively shapes a better future, and involved Yo-Yo performing with talented musicians and weavers of Ōtautahi.

2020-2021 A subsidised Resourceful craft workshop programme for Selwyn District Council delivered in libraries around the area.

2021 Delivered craft workshops at Christchurch East School via Creatives in Schools funding.

2021 Our Resourceful Craft workshop programme at Te Matatiki Toi Ora Arts Centre continues, thanks to Arts Grants from Creative New Zealand, and support from the Arts Centre.

2021 Launched Craft Opportunities programme to address barriers to access to our workshops. This provides free workshops for 'Community Service Card' holders and for those being supported by local NGOs.

 

    2017-2023 Resourceful Craft Workshops

    2019 Waiata ki te wai

     

    2018 Necessary Traditions festival 

     

    2016-2017 Resource: Rise Again

    As a response to this nationwide call for the Resource: Rise Again project, the following 5 designers/teams worked to undertake a thorough exploration of their chosen commercial source of waste in order to test their design responses and their feasibility. 

    Ambrosia Crum (Ngāpuhi) through raranga worked with commercial rope waste from the ports in Tāmaki Makaurau. 

    Designer Clark Bardsley of CBD & architect Andrew Mitchener worked with the waste stream from Cutshop Mt.Wellington, a CNC manufacturer. Clark & Andrew designed a hacker methodology to divert waste by nesting their designs into the wasted space in panels to be cut during the commercial process, leaving much less waste behind.
    Ash Holwell worked with garnet sand being disposed of as a by-product of sandblasting. He explored changing this into a substance that enabled re-use as a glaze.
    Dr Amabel Hunting, Diana Albarrān Gonzālez & Anke Nienhuis staff at AUT, designed lampshades made from sail textiles going to waste within the sailing racing industry.  

     

     

    Some of our other past projects include:

    1. 2013 Our collaboration with Shop Eight to create life in the centre of Ōtautahi Christchurch just as the central Red Zone was drawn back and the city centre started to slowly breathe again.
    2. 2013 The establishment of the Rekindle Studio in Ōtautahi Christchurch, a shared studio space that provided lone-working creatives and small teams with studio space in the central city when this was a novelty.
    3. 2013 Our first pop-up shop in New Regent Street.
    4. 2013-2015 The Offcut Series, a series of works made from our furniture offcuts from artist in Ōtautahi Christchurch.
    5. 2012 Large archways constructed for The Concert, and epic music festival put on by the Student Volunteer Army, where volunteering earned your festival ticket.
    6. 2013 Our making of a long line of trestle tables for the first Social Soup event in Cashel Street.
    7. 2014 The establishment of the Rekindle shop in a shared space with The Auricle.
    8. 2014 Our interior design and fit-out for The Auricle.
    9. 2015 The Pegahorn, a large sculpture made with children at the Chomondeley Children's Home, for Sculpture on the Peninsula.
    10. 2013-2015 Our collaboration with Kilmarnock Enterprises to generate well-made products from waste whilst generating good work.
    11. 2014 The Auckland pop-up shop on Te Wero Island.

    2014 Pop-up on Auckland's waterfront

    2012-2015 Rekindle Furniture Ōtautahi 

     

    2013 Shop Eight & Rekindle Studio

    2013 Social Soup 

    2012 Offcut Archways for The Concert with Student Volunteer Army

    2012 Rekindle team met Prince/King Charles 

    He told us "You're right, nothing should ever go to waste!"