Bottle Adapters

Bottle Adapters are a series of bottle-head designs that can turn PET water bottle waste into private sanitation tools so Puerto Rican earthquake victims living in temporary shelters can have a more private tools to tackle personal hygiene needs. 

In December 2019, a 6.4 magnitude earthquake struck the southwest region of Puerto Rico being the first in 20 years. Many were caught by surprised having had no experience with the kind of disaster, being afraid of the aftershocks, earthquake victims lived in temporary shelters for months continuing. While aid organizations like FEMA hosted fully equipped shelters, Puerto Ricans living in more rural areas preferred to live close to their homes, camping outside in fear of their house would collapse. As the quakes continued, the camps turned into make-shift shelters with less formal equipment.

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As seen from image sources, refugees in the make-shift camps receive water supplies but are seen without partition in their beds and no storage for their personal belonging. Bottle Adapters also tackle indirectly the lack of personal space, by making use of the PET waste that can pile up inside the camp or end up in washed into the ocean.  

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While originally the project featured field visits in Puerto Rico at the disaster site in person, the trip was cancelled mid-March due to COVID-19. As the virus also restricted travel for citizens of Puerto Rico, my team and I worked remotely on the design informed primarily from news updates and secondary accounts. Furthermore, the design considers Puerto Rico's history with hurricanes and issues that have lasted from previous disasters. The course is guided jointly by professor Ignacio Urbina from Pratt Institute and Vladimir Garcia from EAPD.

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Credits 

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Concept, Research, Development           Yuyu Lee, Chi-Hao Chiang, Christian Ramonos

Final Bottle Adaptors Design                    Christian Ramonos

Final Design Render                                 Chi-Hao Chiang

Presentation & Graphic Design                Yuyu Lee