Ghost Nets: The Story Behind the Material

Not everything we use was meant to last forever.
Some things were simply… left behind.

Out in the ocean, thousands of fishing nets are lost or discarded every year. They drift for years, sometimes decades—silent, invisible, and incredibly dangerous.

They are called ghost nets.

These nets don’t just disappear.
They continue to trap fish, turtles, and marine life long after they’ve been abandoned. Moving with currents, they become part of the problem we don’t always see—but is very much there.

For most people, they are waste.
Something to step over on a beach walk.
Something to ignore.

But when you look closer, there’s something else there too.

Layers of colour.
Unexpected textures.
A kind of quiet resilience.

Each piece carries signs of where it’s been—sun, salt, time.

When we started collecting discarded fishing nets from the beaches of Goa, it wasn’t with a plan. It was simply hard to ignore how much of it was there.

And how little of it was being reused.

Working with this material isn’t straightforward.
Every net is different.
Some are too damaged, some too stiff, some too tangled to use.

But the ones that can be saved go through a slow process—cleaning, sorting, and reshaping—before they become part of something new.

Not perfect.
Not identical.
And that’s the point.

What was once harmful becomes something gentle.
Something that belongs inside a home.

Not as a statement piece that demands attention,
but as something that quietly carries a story.

A reminder that waste doesn’t have to be the end of something.

Sometimes, it’s just the beginning of a different form.