We’ve recently worked with the team: R.O. made us keychains in celebration of the agency's 13th birthday, and as a thank you we presented them a postes. Later, Recycle Object came back to us with a request for a more wide scale collaboration: «We wanted to make merch with ecological appeal for a long time. It was important to make it beautiful and desired. We liked the idea of wearing a club t-shirts, because it represents people as members of small communities. We weren’t looking for any notations, instead representing a product in a playful way. That is why we chose illustration. It’s ironic, cute and cool to wear any day».

It was important to us, to create a space of eco-conscious collaborators that could show it stylistically. So, Dasha Surma made the illustrations for Recycle Object, who is also fond of plants, animals and mushrooms. Plus, she’s been following basic ecological habits for a long time.

«I decided to act ecological and not create any extra forms, taking the already existing R.O. flower with 6 leaves. Also, I didn’t want to use a human-character in order to move focus onto something flaural. Of course, it is hardly possible to convey the plant experience through prints on t-shirts, and I did not set such a goal. In addition, I had a fairly specific list of priority points that needed to be reflected in the illustrations: they were all related to environmental habits. Therefore, the character finds himself in a human environment and the plots of the illustrations are also characteristic of a person. 

However, the prints managed to combine my personal interest in plants, a task from R.O. about eco-rituals, and also to avoid moralizing, which is quite typical in the field of environmental statements. The plot about water is very relevant, as a reminder to myself (for some reason, sorting garbage is much easier for me than remembering to turn off the water while brushing my teeth). The character who fixes his flower boots with plaster is me, because other methods of repair are not very good for me. And with the story about the checks, everything has long been clear: in my opinion, this is an atavism», – Dasha talks about creating illustrations.

This collection was supposed to come out in February, and we started drawing illustrations back in November, so there was plenty of time to work on the character. T-shirts came out in time and are now worn not only in Bang! Bang! and Recycle Object offices, but by like-minded people who are interested in the topic of ecology. You can buy one on the website, and order illustrations here or send us an email – bang@bangbangstudio.ru