Recycled Art

The Artist Derick Melander creates large geometric configurations from carefully folded and stacked second-hand clothing. These structures take the form of wedges, columns, walls and enclosures, typically weighing between five hundred pounds and two tons. Smaller pieces directly interact with the surrounding architecture where as his larger works create discrete environments. His rational is that, like architecture, clothing wears, and fades, and decays, representing an intimate record of the human presence. Also like buildings clothing defines the boundary between the individual and the outside world. Check out more at his website!


On September 24th, 2009, Mr. Melander created a monumental sculpture from 3,615lbs of second hand clothing. The resulting piece was a 5 x 7 foot cube made in 4 sections and sat outside the Borough Hall for the 5th Annual Green Brooklyn Green City Fair and Symposium.

Why 3,615 pounds? That's the amount of textile waste created by New Yorkers every 5 minutes. Clothing for the event was loaned by the textile recycling company, Wearable Collections.