The Rotterdam Umbrella Project is a series of untraditional souvenirs that tell a story about the city.
After living in Rotterdam for a few months and biking around in the crazy wind on the bridges and roads, I realized I wanted to feature this as part of my storytelling of the city. I collected broken umbrellas from people in Rotterdam and asked them where in Rotterdam their umbrellas had broken. These unique locations are included in the labels of each product according to the umbrella fabric used for the item.
The products tie the user intimately to the city since the material comes directly from the people of Rotterdam and the storms that caused the umbrellas to break. Additionally, the umbrellas are now able to have a new weather-protecting function.
During this project, I learned about the ability of a product to tell a story as well as appreciating and collecting underutilized sources of material.
Pictures by Thea Bouan (@thearthquake)