City of Sydney – Zero Waste Campaign

Household waste isn't pretty, which is exactly the point. We decided to show household waste in absurd places to highlight the easy methods people could take to remove it. We aimed to strike delight in the viewer as well as disgust, first to spark interest and intrigue, and second to propel action. Combined with the tag line 'Want a tip? Book a free pickup', we playfully conveyed that there are better ways to deal with that old sofa.

Instead of a traditional print campaign, we rose to the challenge of situating the design work in interesting and unusual places. On top of that, we pulled off optical illusions unique to each setting, each requiring different materials, vinyl applications and extensive technical problem solving. The Surry Hills Library installation for instance, was a giant stack of household waste on the side of a building that increased in size every week for three weeks. We designed the stack so it could be easily built upon, using a special type of custom vinyl, so that the shadows from the objects read correctly on the glass.

The intended market was anyone who had illegaly dumped household waste without booking a pickup. We knew that guilting people wasn't the solution, on the contrary the issue was that most people were unaware of the free pickup service, so instead we made light of the issue with humour and after highlighting the problem, we offered them an easy solution. The call to action was the hashtag #bookafreepickup which tied into our strategy of encouraging the posting of the illusions on social media. The result was a virtual doubling of the number of calls to the free pickup service within a week of installation, which continued for the length of the campaign.