What Are Circular Design Principles? | Annie Clementine

Annie Clementine
2 min readMay 16, 2022

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What are circular design principles?

“Circular design is the designing of a cycle in which resources are continuously cycled in various forms, following a reuse and recycle loop. These resources therefore do not go to waste”- Circular Economy Asia

In this post, we explore what circular economy products are and what circular business models help support them.

The overarching conclusion was that in order for us to design truly circular economies, the businesses that contribute must shift from linear models of “take-make-waste’ to circular models:

Circular Business Models

Since writing our last post, we have continued to dive deeper into understanding the Amsterdam Circular Strategy and their plans to fully realize a circular economy by 2050. In my exploration, they broke down 10 ways product design can be circular. So, in order to fully understand the process of circular product design and the models that support it, we’re going to explore the 10 ways circular product design can be achieved over the next ten posts. Our hope is that in our research, we are able to identify circular brands that have successfully used one of the ten design methods to bring a circular product to market, so we as consumers can begin supporting them.

💭 Remember, designing for circularity requires a mindset shift that begins at the very beginning of the value chain. These business owners have taken the bold leap and chosen models that support circularity, despite the fact that many other businesses might be moving faster using linear models. These business leaders understand that investing early in circularity is a long-term investment, not only in their business, but the people and our planet that their products ultimately directly impact.

The circular design principles that we will cover are taken directly from the Amsterdam Circular Strategy and are as follows:

Source: City of Amsterdam

If you’d like to learn more about Amsterdam’s ambitious goal of becoming a circular city by 2020, read their full strategy here.

About Annie Clementine: Sustainable fashion company that designs women’s bags with circular principles.

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