WHEN faced with a modest P30,000 budget to decorate a carroza carrying the image of Santo Tomas de Villanueva, local designer Dan Wilson Damicog saw an opportunity in what others had thrown away.
Representing the City of Danao during the Halad sa Pagtuo 2026 procession at the Cebu City Sports Center, Damicog transformed thousands of discarded plastic spoons and dried corn husks into an intricate floral display.
The project began as a practical solution to a financial constraint.
While the Danao City Government provided a P30,000 allocation for fresh flowers, the amount was barely enough to cover a full arrangement for a grand float designed to honor Danao’s patron saint.
Rather than compromise on the design needed for the solemn showcase, Damicog turned to upcycling to stretch every peso.
“Out of what the city gave me for the fresh flowers itself, it was only 30k. That budget is really small. So, we looked for ways to truly enhance it so our decorations would look very grand,” Damicog said, recalling the initial challenge of scaling the design within budget limits.
The centerpiece of the float features 3,000 to 4,000 used plastic spoons collected from previous church youth group activities and reshaped into faux blossoms.
Sourcing the background textures proved equally local. Damicog gathered discarded corn husks directly from farmers in the mountain barangays of Danao, pairing them with inexpensive pearl accents purchased online to add a subtle shimmer.
The labor behind the transformation required patience, heat, and many hands over two full weeks.
“The spoon was exposed to heat, then put into water so it could be molded into a flower,” Damicog said, describing the process of heating each plastic spoon over a heat source and plunging it into cold water to sculpt the petals.
What could have been a tedious solitary task turned into a community affair.
Damicog’s family, consisting of about seven members, stepped in to help, spending a week of late-night work shaping spoons and assembling components.
Soon after, local youth from the parish joined the effort, turning the workshop into a nightly gathering after their classes.
“In my family itself, there are about seven of us. Then the youth from the church, they also helped. After class, at night, we would just talk, and it became like bonding for us,” Damicog said.
Beyond saving money for the current festival, Damicog designed the float with longevity in mind.
The upcycled elements are durable enough to be stored and reused for future chapel events and parish celebrations in Danao, reducing future costs and waste.
For Damicog, the finished float carrying Santo Tomas de Villanueva stands as a message about seeing potential where others see trash.
“That’s really my goal, that there’s still more not just with fresh flowers. Let us try something new that we can still recycle from the trash that we see,” Damicog said. (ABC)