The world is teeming with waste, and one of the growing offenders is ceramic. Although it’s popular for its durability, this material does not biodegrade. Once discarded, it can sit in landfills for centuries. The industry’s waste problem has only worsened with the increasing demand for ceramic products.

Yet, amidst the growing pile of discarded ceramics, one young designer saw an opportunity not just to change how we think about waste but to modify it into something useful.

Shashank Nimkar, a National Institute of Design (NID) graduate, has spent the past few years doing just that. Through his startup, Earth Tatva, he has turned ceramic waste into a versatile material that is being used by artists, architects, and designers.

His story to establish this resourceful venture is as much about environmental consciousness as it is about design, creativity, and problem-solving.

For the 32-year-old, the idea of recycling ceramic waste didn’t come overnight, it was a slow discovery. After completing his undergraduate degree in animation film design from Symbiosis Institute of Design in Pune, he worked as a freelancer for a couple of years in the advertising industry.

But his real turning point came when he pursued his master’s in industrial design at NID, Ahmedabad, where he specialised in ceramic and glass design. It was during a trip to the ceramic manufacturing hub of Khurja in Uttar Pradesh in 2017 that the entrepreneur had the “aha” moment that would set his future on an entirely new path.

“We were walking around the streets, visiting factories, and I noticed an alarming sight where ceramic waste was dumped everywhere. I spoke to different industrialists and realised ceramics would never biodegrade. This waste was here to stay, long after we were gone,” he tells The Better India.

From classroom to startup: How NID led to a scalable idea

‘Why are we here as designers?’ This was the first question Shashank had after seeing the piles of ceramic garbage.

He explains further, “Every new season, new colours, new shapes, new collections, we are just adding to this burden without doing anything to the existing ceramic.” This moment of realisation spurred the student to dig deeper into the issue of ceramic waste, and from that, Earth Tatva was born.

© The Better India