Seeking to reduce their environmental impact, ambitious retail players are pursuing circular production through reusable and recyclable goods and materials. Yet to rebalance our relationship with the planet, we also need to take better care of our existing belongings. So we asked: can technology enable this?

Digital tokens for your furniture

A collaboration with WINT Design Lab and Zünc Studio, Carbon Banks introduces digital amplifiers — uniquely evolving NFTs — to encourage sustainable behaviour. Each piece of Carbon Banks furniture would feature a distinctive pattern acting as a key that binds the NFT to the item. Scanning the pattern would mint an NFT on the blockchain, which the owner can access using a private key.

The evolving digital NFT displays milestones, rewards maintenance and repairs, and narrates the chair’s life cycle. Viewable through augmented reality or shared virtual spaces, it helps create an emotional connection akin to nurturing plants and instils a sense of guardianship for physical objects. In doing so, Carbon Banks incentivises sustainable furniture practices, redefining our relationship with material possessions while exploring the potential of digital twins.

What’s next

The project raises essential questions about digital ownership and technology’s ability to promote more emotional, sustainable relationships with our furniture. While further exploration is needed, emerging technologies like NFTs offer opportunities to shift human behaviour to benefit planetary health, particularly for more sustainable blockchain technologies that utilise proof-of-stake (PoS) instead of proof-of-work (PoW).