Mending Lands opens with a simple proposition: design can begin with ecological repair rather than human need. The exhibition presents the results of Marte Mei's year-long investigation into PFAS, a group of so-called "forever chemicals" that accumulate in soil, water, wildlife, and human bodies, and are linked to serious long-term health effects. Her research led her to phytoremediation : the process through which plants extract toxins from the soil. Working with C-Biotech, Marte Mei used a hemp cultivation method that draws a significant percentage of PFAS from polluted land in a single harvest, initiating a cycle of soil regeneration.

The harvested stems, which remain uncontaminated, are transformed into phytoresin: an original biomaterial developed by Marte Mei and Beologic. Shelves, side tables, mirrors, and sculptural wall pieces in the exhibition are cast from this resin, within which the hemp fibres remain visibly suspended.

Presented alongside PFASLANDS, a thirty minute documentary, the exhibition traces the project from polluted fields to formed objects. It follows a cycle that moves not from extraction to production, but from damage towards repair.

BIO:

Marte Mei (b. 1992, Netherlands) is an Amsterdam-based designer and researcher. She studied at the Rietveld Academie before completing an MA in Social Design at the Design Academy Eindhoven, where she developed a methodology called Land-Allyship: a framework that positions humans as collaborators within ecological systems rather than extractors of resources. Her practice unfolds through site-specific research, translating sustained exchange with ecologists, scientists, and local communities into furniture, objects, and spatial interventions.