WELCOME TO MAKERS PLACE — a brief introduction to this project that helps oceans stay clean for habitat and species protection from pollution. Plans for Makers Place II are already underway; join us on Patreon to support these projects.

The organic design of Makers Place, seen just days after building completion on Soneva Fushi.

Aside from the recent global pandemic, two conversations have dominated international discourse over the past years and will continue to do so on an accelerating scale: plastic pollution and global warming driven by carbon emissions.

I founded the Distil Ennui Studio™ in 1990. Since then, I have created and exhibited work around the world while working on community and environmental projects, hosting recycling design workshops, and spearheading international artist residency programmes. Throughout this time, water has remained central to my practice. Seeing first-hand the effects of pollution and species extinction, I have been a vocal advocate of the 3R strategy — Reduce, Reuse, Recycle — from the very beginning.

Sand casting boxes cooling with newly formed sculptures inside.

It is with great sadness that the drinks industry can be attributed to approximately 15% of global warming impacts over the past decade alone. Over 90% of aluminium and plastic packaging from this sector is still buried in landfill, burned, or dumped in the ocean (supporting data here). To put this into daily terms, more than 13 billion plastic drinks containers are produced every single day.

‘Enjoy’ — a Molotov-style sculpture made from recycled Coca-Cola aluminium cans.

In the late 1980s, I kayaked alone and unsupported for nine months across the Maldives, creating my own water using only the sun and living within a zero-footprint framework. I distributed hand-built aluminium can crushers to the few hotels operating at the time, proposing that crushed cans be returned home by guests for recycling — an early attempt to suggest ethical responsibility within tourism.

The hand-built outrigger kayak used to travel across the Maldives while creating ‘Visions from the Shoreline’.

At the time, most waste was transported to uninhabited islands and buried, accelerating erosion and leading to the disappearance of entire islands during storms. In 2017, I returned by kayak to the same locations, creating sculptural and photographic interventions under the project ‘Visions from the Shoreline’.

Twenty artworks from this project were donated to the Soneva Namoona Foundation, raising $100,000 USD to fund future development. You can read about the reasoning behind this donation here.

One of the first ‘Drink Less’ sculptures photographed in the ocean from which its materials were recovered.

To place the problem in real numbers: recycling aluminium uses just 1/25th of the energy required to produce it from raw ore; plastic recycling uses approximately 1/20th. Every piece of single-use packaging not recycled directly compounds the global warming crisis.

The Maldives faces an additional threat through thermal expansion. As ocean water warms, it expands, contributing significantly to rising sea levels — a profound risk for island nations.

‘The Naive Twins’ — recycled aluminium sculptural works.

Makers Place is a carbon-neutral facility designed from the ground up for island-based methodology. Machinery and processes were hand-built to recycle aluminium and plastic while minimising water use, emissions, and long-term environmental impact.

A Hawksbill sea turtle photographed just metres from the Makers Place recycling studio.

The facility includes closed-loop wash stations, advanced filtration systems using coconut charcoal, and VOC capture systems to prevent harmful emissions. At the end of their lifecycle, spent filtration materials are sealed into red construction blocks, locking contaminants away permanently and preserving the integrity of future redevelopment.

‘Drink Less’ sculptures made from recycled Coca-Cola aluminium cans.

In just the first three days of operation, the facility recycled 15,000 aluminium cans. From these, a series of ‘Drink Less’ sculptures were completed, reinterpreting the classic glass Coca-Cola bottle to provoke wider awareness of the environmental cost of convenience culture.

‘Drink Less’ half bottle, recycled aluminium cans with artist-made cedar frame.

This project exists to enable a better end-of-life for materials while protecting lands where I have advocated for change at community, island, and governmental levels for over 35 years.

“The greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it. I feel compelled to face a global issue on a personal scale.” — AJH