Tamsin Coultas

The Very Hungry Consumer

This project addresses topics of consumer culture and sustainability. I’ve readapted the popular children’s storybook ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’ by Eric Carle, employing Narrative Persuasion, utilising techniques of readaptation and parody, to bring attention to and critique normalised consumer behaviours in society, and ultimately encourage a shift surrounding consumer habits.

My project creates a juxtaposition of childhood comfort with a satirical and disarming tone of voice to engage an audience and force self-reflection.
Using practise-led methology, waste becomes both message and medium and utilising design methodologies and techniques encourages audiences to recognise their own roles in cycles of overconsumption, while envisioning a more sustainable design practice, which contributes to the overall aim of the project; to bring awareness to overconsumption and it’s negative implications.