Low waste lifestyle becomes a life mantra for this architect

Architect Vishnu Priya wanted to design a toilet that consumes very less water. While doing research, she stumbled upon a lot of alternative practices when it comes to toilet models, sanitation, etc. When she discussed the same with her architect friends, they had no idea about it. Shocked with their response, Vishnu Priya decided to create awareness about it. “I took a documentary called Meel to create awareness about waste management. While working on the documentary, I learned more about consumerism and how much waste we are generating daily. I decided to transform myself and slowly started understanding the difference between want and need. I started practising a low waste lifestyle by bringing small changes in my life,” says Vishnu Priya. 

The architect has also been documenting and archiving people, incidents, happenings from across the globe with regard to domestic waste pollution and talking about the need for low waste lifestyle. “I started my journey by removing plastic from my life. I started noticing where my waste comes from. All the personal care products come in plastic bottles. I started looking for alternatives and decided to make them at home. My mother also helped me with this. Today, I am at a place where I can share the actual practises of my low waste lifestyle,” she adds. 

During the lockdown, she started working on a book for children above the age of five. “We tell children to avoid plastic, but we don’t voice out what options or alternatives we have for plastics. I have identified the objects children belonging to that age group use and have suggested alternative options for those objects in the book. The book titled Into My World of Non Plastics will be published by Thannaram Publications and is designed by Thiagarajan R,” concludes Vishnu Priya.