KUMAR PRASHANT
SIMPLY
Cover Story
From setting up a 5,000 square animal shelter made of waste plastic bottles and cans to doing up “India’s first fully green office” for Thoughtworks, Kumar Prashant, 27, is giving design a socially and environmentally conscious twist. An artist and animal welfare activist, he built a shelter using over 20,000 waste plastic bottles and tyres for People for Animals. People were urged to donate in their waste plastic and Prashant fashioned it into a shelter for injured and abandoned animals. “There is an urgent need to promote environment conscious living by promoting recycling, upcycling and reusing of waste when possible,” says Prashant, who quit his mechanical engineering course in the final semester. But his study of mechanics comes handy each time the designer-artist creates a new space under his brand Rebirth, which he started with Nivedita Joshee Chopra, 35, in 2012. Prashant uses a variety of waste materials—glass, plastic, wood, tyres, electronics and metal scraps—and gives them a cosmetic touchup depending on what its final functionality and application is.
Functional Art What makes Rebirth’s work interesting is that it doesn’t sit only in art galleries but is widely integrated into modern spaces such as a number of bars and restaurants in the city. Among Prashant’s key projects is Thoughtworks, an IT firm which has used numerous upcycled elements in its 35,000 square feet office. The city’s popular restaurants like Hidden Place, Swig, Tales and Spirits and Euriska also carry Prashant’s upcycled works. He recently created a 35 feet high exterior installation for KSH Logistics in Chakan made of recycled industrial tools. “At 35 feet, it is the tallest exterior recycled installation of its kind,” he says. An advocate of recycling, Prashant urges people to do their bit for the environment by simple segregation of waste and holding waste collection drives. “Sell plastic to a raddiwala to recycle, use cloth bags and refuse plastic,” he says..