Lego Clutch is an eclectic statement piece that embraces the use of upcycling, material, and versatility. Wear it alone as a clutch bag or mix and match it with a hanging strap of your choice.
My Role: Product Design, Wearable Design
Tools: Rapid Prototyping, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator
Challenge: Upcycle ♻️
With a higher rate of return than gold, bonds, and stocks, I knew I could put my Lego pieces to good use. That's how this personal project came to be: Finding my old Lego's that were in excellent shape and upcycling them into a beautiful and useful accessory.
Creating a Lego purse is not an original idea, but the process of creating it was 100% unknown to me. While my curiosity to transform a box of Lego's to an elegant and eclectic piece of fashion was motivation on its own, I was also driven by the curiosity of the process.
Process
Materials
LEGO PIECES
The afterlife of a product is as important, if not more, than its initial purpose. I sourced and organized the Lego pieces I had and created an inventory of which pieces and color I would need since the Lego parts I owned were the basic elementary color. While I planned to use them all, I also knew I wanted a blend of other novelty color Lego's (beige, olive, brown, dark grey).
ELASTIC STRING
The Lego Clutch required a unifying material that would allow it to be flexible. Glueing the pieces together would lead to a fragile object, so an elastic string that was thin enough to fit through small drilled holes was the best option.
The Build
EXPERIMENTING
When experimenting with the Lego pieces, I took note of a couple of things:
• The maximum and minimum size of the drill
• The strength required to drill through a sturdy 4.65 mm thick plastic
• The precise locations on the Lego piece to drill without compromising the structure of each piece
MANUAL VS. ELECTRICAL
I attempted to drill through the Lego pieces with a manual drill with the expectation that I would have more control. I quickly found that I needed a lot more strength in order to push the manual drill. I then moved on to use an electrical drill that was small enough to maneuver with confidence.
DRILLING
The drilling step was strategically planned out to reduce the change of accidentally drilling extra holes. Depending on the position of the Lego piece, each Lego required 8 to 12 holes drilled. I organized the Lego's in a way where any piece that required less than 12 holes (max) were drilled first. This was in case I accidentally drilled an extra hole; I would continue drilling 12 holes and trade this piece with any remaining Lego piece.
The Threading
To bring all of the 118 pieces of Lego's together, all seven of the columns were stitched through loops. This was followed by threading the columns together horizontally. The pattern of threading and elasticity of the thread allowed for a sturdy and flexible overall product.
The Support
The elasticity of the horizontal threading created a morphing effect on the lateral sides of the purse (comprised of the 2x2 plate pieces). Additional support was added to the inside of the lateral sides by including another 2x8 Lego plate.
The Wear
The Lego Clutch is a small but mighty statement piece that is sure to be a conversation starter. It includes special Lego pieces on each side to add a hang chain and increase the comfort of wearing it. These Lego pieces can be rearranged for extra versatility.
