In the early 1990s, millions of hardworking Nigerians struggled to find potable water while out on the street on their daily hustle. To solve this problem, some entrepreneurs started to hawk chilled water in thin transparent white nylon bags known as “ice pure water” and sold them commercially. No one cared if the water was really “pure”, we just called them “pure water” in nylons. Yodi was what we popularly called them in Lagos, I grew up drinking some of them.
Then in 1994, Sir Isaac Adeagbo Akinpade, regarded as Pioneer entrepreneur, introduced this better packaged water in low-density polyethylene nlyons. “DIL Pure Water” initiated by Deagbo Industries Limited in Ibadan, Oyo State, soon made its way to Sagamu and then Lagos, where it was quickly adopted and replaced the earlier pure water in yodi nylons.
Owing to its affordability, in time, the industry grew exponentially. The annual turnover of the industry has been estimated in excess of N20 billion. In 2017, NAFDAC reported that Nigerians consumed 10 million sachets of pure water daily. 10 million used sachet! Needless to say, with this growth came the problem of waste.
For decades, the pure water sachet was both a needed solution to an everyday problem, and also a systemic menace to environmental sanity. 32 years after it still is a problem – and a solution. Cheap, accessible, and widely consumed, it remains the primary source of drinking water for millions of Nigerians. But once the water is gone, the sachet becomes invisible, discarded, ignored, and absorbed into the landscape of drains, dump sites, and waterways – many channelled by flood into the oceans.
This is where Adejoke Lasisi begins her work. She has chosen to confront one of Nigeria’s most persistent waste streams head-on. Rather than treating discarded sachets as an environmental afterthought, she treats them as raw material, objects with untapped value, waiting to be reimagined.
An upcycler, Lasisi is an Ibadan-based Nigerian fashion designer and environmentalist.
During a recent documentary photoshoot by Adebote Mayowa documenting Adejoke’s work, they moved deliberately between two worlds: the dump site, where sachet waste accumulates in staggering volumes, and the finished garment, elegant, intentional, and undeniably beautiful.
At the dump site, these sachets exist as symbols of neglect: low-density polyethylene nylons that will take 10 to 40 years to degrade, clogging drainage systems, worsening floods, and fragmenting into microplastics that threaten ecosystems and human health. It is from places like these that Adejoke sources some of her materials, recovering what society has already discarded.
Using over 4,000 discarded pure water sachets, Adejoke transformed waste that once polluted the environment into a striking dress, one that challenges how we define fashion, value, and sustainability. The contrast between origin and outcome is intentional.
As Nigeria advances conversations around the circular economy, Adejoke’s work offers a grounded, human-scale example of what circularity looks like in practice. At its core, circular economy is about eliminating waste by keeping materials in use for as long as possible, and this is exactly what her work achieves.
While many recycling efforts focus on high-value plastics or export-driven recovery systems, sachet nylons often remain overlooked. Adejoke’s intervention fills this gap, demonstrating that even the most undervalued materials can be reintegrated into the value chain through creativity, design, and intention.
Her work also intersects with another global challenge: the environmental cost of fast fashion, which contributes nearly 10 percent of global carbon emissions. Through her fashion practice and the Planet 3R initiative, Adejoke offers an alternative model, one rooted in reuse and environmentally responsible processes. Her work is not only creating fashion, she is advancing Nigeria’s circular economy, one discarded sachet at a time.
Bearing Witness Through Documentary Practice
As a documentary photographer, my role in this process is simple but important, to bear witness. To document the journey of materials from dump site to design, and to visually trace how innovation, creativity, and environmental responsibility intersect in real lives and real places.
Photography allows these stories to travel, to exhibitions, public conversations, and global platforms, expanding the reach of circular economy beyond technical language into something people can see, feel, and understand.
By Adebote Mayowa
