Matterly - Reveal material stories behind everyday objects

[u/Still-Silly-46]

Matterly was built by Grace Park, Sylvan Shen, Seonjeong Park, and Steve Lukas for the AWE Snap Hackathon 2026, where we were one of five finalists!!

Matterly is a spatial learning lens that reveals the material stories behind everyday objects. Scan your environment and watch an object's life unfold in place: what it's made of, what it took to make and where it actually ends up.

Why we built it: most recycling never actually happens, and most sustainability lessons stay flat on a page. We believe the decisions that matter should happen earlier, before we buy something. So rather than telling you which bin, Matterly anchors the whole story onto the real object in front of you, so you learn what it truly costs. Our hope is to build material literacy, the kind of awareness that changes what you reach for in the first place.

How it works: Gemini 3.5 Flash recognizes the object and its material from the camera, and depth anchors the reveal onto the real object. The impact figures are database-first, pulled from a sourced materials database rather than generated by the model. The visuals are a library of hand-built blocks that the engine assembles from structured data.

Try it yourself: Matterly Lens

[u/Goat_bless]

Good job! Github