Re-Identify is a behaviour change design project built on a single premise: waste is not a physical state. It is a mental category.
Research shows that 70% of students own duplicate stationery they have never fully used — yet when a tool goes missing, the default response is to buy new, not to look for what already exists. The problem is not that students don’t care. The problem is that the system makes buying new the path of least resistance at every decision point.
Lost Tools Shelter is the physical answer — a repurposed wooden drawer cabinet installed at a key circulation point between the studio and the Art Shop. Each rescued tool is given a name, a personality, and a short story. Old Faithful has been in four pencil cases and will outlive your degree. The Fixer is 80% full and waiting for something to break. A tool with a name is no longer a cheap commodity. It is something worth rescuing.
The full system spans six components — a physical shelter, two intercepting posters, a character sticker reward system, a digital platform, and a printed guidebook — designed to trigger three conditions for behaviour change simultaneously: interrupt the habit, remove the friction, make participation visible.
Tested on Earth Day 2026 at LCC, the results were clear: 12 tools adopted, 90% of participants had never previously considered the environmental impact of everyday stationery, and 66% said they would check for existing resources before buying new next time.
The model works. It now needs scale.