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How Do You Begin With Something Broken? 

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Emerging from Rhode Island’s industrial legacy, Reharvest Repair approaches not a blank canvas, but artifacts of what was left behind—cracks, scraps, and fragments—to make something new. It challenges rapid production and reproduction—the unending generation of waste which marks this century. Born from an intersecting vision of Ayako Maruyama and Markus Berger, this project explores the resistance, reimagination, and complete reinterpretation of a material’s identity to improve architecture and design. Through evolving mapping tools, workshops, and material study, Reharvest Repair invites the community of Providence to embrace the existing and learn how to unmake the made. This photo series will walk through the studio space of Repair Atelier, a branch of the larger initiative led by Markus Berger which researches how to repurpose waste in physical architecture.

In 2024, the Rhode Island Resource Recovery Corporation (RIRRC) reported that only 7.8 percent of municipal waste was diverted from landfills, a half-percentage drop from the previous year. In sharp contrast, Warwick, the second most populous city in Rhode Island, had a 50.2 percent waste diversion rate in 2024 and the state had an average of 29.3 percent diversion. The failure to divert waste in Providence is contributing to an impending waste crisis in Rhode Island. The vast majority of waste generated in Rhode Island ends up in the state-run Central Landfill in Johnston, RI. The landfill takes in 750,000 tons of waste annually, roughly 10 percent of which is generated by Providence. RIRRC Corporation officials report that the landfill is likely going to run out of space in the next twenty years. While a 2024 grant awarded to Providence by the US Department of Agriculture will help transform Providence waste management, individuals and communities need to change their behaviors and perspectives to help reduce landfill waste.

Reharvest Repair exemplifies an intentional diversion and renewal of waste, a practice that the state of Rhode Island must learn from.

[Entrance to the Repair Atelier Studio]
Located within a once abandoned church, Repair Atelier not only repurposes material but is itself a repurposed space.
Embracing imperfection to challenge architecture’s obsession with pristineness, the cracks in the ceilings are not concealed but celebrated through the Japanese practice of Kintsugi. 
Working as a lab for design, Repair Atelier focuses on the unmaking and remaking, where discarded materials become the value ingredients of reinvention.
Disassembled but not discarded, every limb of what once was a chair is brought to life again with imaginative design. 
Experimentation is deliberate as Markus meticulously interacts with the found furniture. 
Sometimes repair can not only be visible, but even highlighted through creative choices of material and design. 
[Sample slabs of material exploration] 
Disposed by manufacturers for their slight imperfections, these sturdy resin filled yarn cores are seen as vibrant building blocks. Early success in working with industrial resources serves as an important foundation for Reharvest Repair as it continues to seek out industrial collaborators.
In this studio, it is not only the fragments that undergo transformation, but also the very act of connection. Torn paper bags, water, and starch are tested as adaptive joinery—an experimental method of binding scraps from diverse origins.
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