The exhibition co-organized with Vitra Design Museum, "Plastic: Remaking Our World”, focuses on the dual nature of plastic—once a symbol of innovation but now at the forefront of environmental issues. It reflects on the problems behind convenience and explores practical solutions and the role of design.
The exhibition reviews the evolution and challenges of plastic from its inception to the present, alongside Vitra Design Museum's research process. It also highlights Hyundai Motor's efforts to minimize carbon emissions and promote sustainability with the exhibition features eco-friendly materials used in the IONIQ, and "P2H (plastic-to-hydrogen)" process for producing eco-friendly hydrogen energy from waste plastic.

Plastic is everywhere, it’s the fabric of everyday life. Used and experienced differently across the globe as product and waste, it is essential yet superfluous, life-saving and life-threatening, seductive but dangerous.
Never has there been more urgency to understand the evolution of this man-made material over the past 150-years and to unpack the wonderous, yet cautionary tale of its invention and use. “Plastic: Remaking Our World” charts the material’s unparalleled rise, enormous popularity, and the dawning realization of its destructive power. Probing design’s role within this story, it asks how plastic has both enabled extraordinary innovations and new ways of living, and at the same time contributed to the inescapable crisis of plastic pollution today.
Divided into three sections, the exhibition opens with a film installation exploring the relationship between plastic and nature at a fundamental, geological level. The second section traces the history of plastic from its natural origins to the scientific experiments that were carried out with synthetic materials in the mid-nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It continues with the rise of the petrochemical industry and its impact on the scale of production in manufacturing as well as the concern for the planet that grew towards the end of the twentieth century. Finally, the third section takes stock of contemporary efforts to rethink plastic and to implement alternatives, to reduce production and consumption and encourage reuse of plastic.
With this look to the future, “Plastic: Remaking Our World” is a call to action at this time of climate emergency.

This immersive film installation takes the visitor on a journey from the emergence of microscopic life in the earth’s oceans, to their ongoing accumulation and transformation beneath the sea floor through to its discovery two billion years later in the form of oil.
The second half of the film documents the ubiquity of plastic products and waste, and in time the resulting contamination of the world’s marine ecosystem as they breakdown into microplastics.
Johann Strauss’ The Blue Danube accompanies the film. This waltz was performed at the 1867 Paris Exposition, where the semi-synthetic plastic “Parkesine” won a silver medal and gave birth to the plastics industry.
The title Kalpa is a Sanskrit word referring to a period of time in Hindu and Buddhist cosmology. It spans the creation, destruction, and recreation of the world.

Plastics created from natural materials have been around for thousands of years. Used for decorative purposes, materials such as ivory and horn enhanced the look and value objects. Industrialization and a rise in incomes in the late nineteenth century increased demand for natural plastics and kindled interest in new materials that could replace or even outperform materials sourced from nature.
Just as today, plastics were a geopolitical issue at the end of the nineteenth century. The colonial networks of Western European countries exploited the peoples and lands of the Global South. The enormous demand for materials like ivory or natural rubber, for example, led to shortages in the markets. This vast over-extraction of natural resources to meet demand led to the near-extinction of some species. The hope was, therefore, that early man-made plastics like Parkesine and Casein would offer the natural world a reprieve of sorts.
In the early twentieth century, advances in material experimentation led to the invention of fully synthetic materials and the arrival of a wealth of new possibilities. Plastics such as Bakelite could be manufactured at a scale never seen before.

Advances in the chemical sciences in the 1920s led to the understanding of plastics at the molecular level: plastics are made up of long chains of repeating molecular units called polymers. To exploit this evolution from hopeful experimentation to polymer science, chemical and petroleum companies joined forces to advance research in the field. The invention of new plastics including vinyl, polyethylene, acrylic and nylon followed apace.
Following World War II, the oil and petrochemical industries strove to establish plastic as the material of everyday life. The shift from coal to mineral oil and natural gas as the basis for plastic production in the 1950s hailed the start of the “petrochemical era.”
The shift from thermoset plastics that harden when heated but cannot be remolded, to thermoplastics that can be reheated and remolded without changing their chemical composition, enabled lighter, more flexible products. Manufacturing required expensive molds and cheaper raw materials, which encouraged the mass-production of plastic objects.

In the second half of the twentieth century, mass-production processes such as injection moulding and vacuum forming enabled limitless design possibilities. The aims of the industry—targeted at the mass-production of single-use plastic products—fuelled the throw-away culture.
From 1970 to the present day, annual plastic production globally has increased eightfold to 400 million tons. More than half of the plastic produced to date has been manufactured since 2000. Plastics permeate all areas of life, from food packaging to electrical appliances, from furniture to cars and aircraft, from clothing to architecture. Even medicine is dependent on plastic now.
Towards the end of the twentieth century, the vast amounts of plastic—much of it encountered as litter—were spurring concern for the planet. But within a few decades, the public image of plastic shifted from a visionary, democratic material full of possibility to one that is deeply contested. Our dependence on plastic has been marred by the knowledge that the world is choking on too much of the stuff.

What was once considered a blessing—the durability and resistance of plastic—turns out to be a curse. From exported waste and polluted beaches to microplastics found on mountain peaks and in the depths of the world’s oceans, the fatal impact of plastic on people’s lives and the planet dominates the news nowadays.
Scientists, designers, activists, and legislators are leading efforts to find new ways to address and reduce pollution. To achieve a circular plastics economy, we must reduce production of single-use plastics, create objects that are designed for reuse, repair, or recycling, reinvent plastics based on renewable resources and biodegradable materials, and rethink our relationship with plastics.
It is clear that there is no single solution. A multiplicity of approaches—local and global, individual and societal—are needed to tackle the plastic crisis. Plastics manufacturers must be held accountable for what happens to their products after use. Designers must consider the whole lifecycle of a product from the start. Consumers must influence the industry through their choices. Since new and alternative approaches are seen initially as more expensive, legislators must set in place regulations and create incentives.
Collectively we must remake our world.

Hyundai Motor has introduced the IONIQ lineup, boldly incorporating eco-friendly materials in all specifications to open a new chapter in sustainable mobility experiences.
This section explores various components of the IONIQ that utilize eco-friendly materials, such as flaxseed oil-infused leather seats developed through natural material research, dashboards with bio-plastic skin made from sugarcanes, and headliners containing organic materials. Additionally, you can discover how waste is transformed into recycled materials, including seats made from recycled plastic, carpets made from discarded fishing nets, and interior and exterior components painted with materials derived from processed waste tires.
Experience Hyundai Motor’s dedicated efforts and visionary approach to reducing harmful substances, such as plastics, which have long been prevalent in the mobility industry.

Recycling is a global concern, yet consumers rarely know where their waste ends up and how much of it is actually recycled. Of the 8.3 billion metric tons of plastic produced worldwide since the beginning of the 20th century, only around 9 per cent has been recycled.
This section explores solutions to the plastic recycling problem by examining Hyundai Motor Group's P2H(Plastic-to-Hydrogen) process, which extracts hydrogen from waste plastic, and introducing Dave Hakkens' “Precious Plastic” project, which transforms plastic waste into new DIY objects.
The P2H process is an innovative solution that produces hydrogen energy from unrecyclable plastics that are incinerated or landfilled. Hyundai Motor Group aims to contribute to the waste plastic circular issue and accelerate the establishment of a hydrogen society by environmentally processing 120,000 tons of waste plastic annually to produce 23,000 tons of hydrogen with a purity of 99.99%.
The “Precious Plastic” project provides a playful entry into the subject and offers practical know-how guidance on how to construct simple recycling machines, incidentally helping to create an international network of small-scale DIY recycling initiatives.