In the spring of 2011, Lucia Phinney and Jaquelin T. Robertson Visiting Professor Lionel Devlieger led an option studio entitled “Tools for Conviviality,” which sought to understand the wood industry in Virginia and how its waste products might be reused.

One outcome of the studio‘s research was a composition that mapped various flows of wood between initial states, used products, and disposed ends. The research for the body of the diagram was derived from within two industries: material recovery facilities (MRF) that break down construction and demolition debris for reuse, and mills of different wood and paper types that produce not only specific products for human consumption but also create by-products and waste in many forms.