About

Merry-Go-Round use industrial waste material from local companies to create products which optimally make use of material characteristics. The variation in resources makes a starting point in our design process, following through all the way to the final product. The project consists of a collaboration between the design collective Design Stories and producers and artisans Returhuset. We also cooperate with local producers providing us with their waste material resources and collect material from a municipal recycling centre adjoining Returhuset.

Kerstin Sylwan and Jenny Stefansdotter from Design Stories.  Photo: Ann Eringstam

Design Stories use design as a tool for visualizing and enabling change. We want to show the visionary potential of design and the design method’s ability to be part of defining society. A common working method for us is to collaborate with non-profit and social organizations to test new ways of designing and producing artifacts as well as trying to alter the societal fabric – that is, to use design to change the perception of what and who has value. Our emphasis is on social and environmental issues and the implications this has on design and production. We aim to create more beauty from less resources.

Returhuset is a working and meeting place that recycles and economize on resources, thus contributing to an urban ecological development. Here, furniture, bikes and lots of different materials are given a new life and design, while job seekers are supported on their way into work. In Returhuset’s various workshops new things are produced out of reclaimed materials with eco-friendly methods and techniques. Materials donated by the nearby recycle park are recovered and furniture and bicycles carefully reconditioned so that they can be used again. The craft items are sold in our shop at Returhuset. From spring 2013 you will also find our first serial produced item, Drawstring Lamp, in selected interior shops and in Merry-Go-Round’s web shop.

The heart of Returhuset is our eco-café serving food and home baked bread and cookies. The café is part of the network of fair-trade coffee shops in Gothenburg. Locally produced, organic or eco- and Fairtrade labeled produce are a priority in all food and drinks. You can choose to sit indoors, maybe by the fire in wintertime or outdoors in our scrap metal garden in the summer.

Returhuset is a municipal operation belonging to SDF Östra Göteborg. We’ve been around since 1995. Since 2007, we are also part of Kretsloppsparken Alelyckan.

Visit/post address: Kretsloppsparken Alelyckan Lärjeågatan 12 415 25 Göteborg

Email: returhuset@ostra.goteborg.se

Phone: 031-365 44 43 (Coordinator)