{"id":13607,"date":"2023-02-03T19:26:09","date_gmt":"2023-02-04T00:26:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/?p=13607"},"modified":"2023-02-03T19:26:11","modified_gmt":"2023-02-04T00:26:11","slug":"seven-key-materials-designers-are-relying-on-to-create-more-sustainable-products","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/2023\/02\/03\/seven-key-materials-designers-are-relying-on-to-create-more-sustainable-products\/","title":{"rendered":"Seven key materials designers are relying on to create more sustainable products<\/a>"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

We have rounded up seven\u00a0materials\u00a0that designers are using to replace more polluting mainstays such as plastic, concrete and leather in a bid to limit the impacts of\u00a0climate change. With\u00a0a recent study\u00a0finding that human-made materials now outweigh the total mass of Earth’s living biomass, designers are becoming increasingly aware of how the products they design impact the planet (Hahn, 2021).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From using renewable, carbon capturing materials such as\u00a0cork,\u00a0algae<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0latex<\/strong>\u00a0to turning\u00a0reclaimed\u00a0food waste into food packaging, the focus is now on the entire lifecycle of a product. This includes how raw ingredients are sourced and how they can ultimately be reused, recycled or returned to nature once the product reaches the end of its life (Hahn, 2021).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mycelium leather<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the fashion industry looks to replace animal leather and its synthetic substitutes, a number of high-profile brands have hedged their bets on alternatives made from\u00a0mycelium<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 the root-like structure that fungi use to grow.<\/em> The leather is grown from spores in a lab, which expands into a sheet of interwoven filaments that is then tanned and dyed to recreate the look and feel of real leather (Hahn, 2021).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Biomaterial companies <\/strong>claim\u00a0that mycelium leather emits fewer greenhouse gases and consumes fewer natural resources in its production than the manufacture of plastic leather and the rearing of livestock, which is responsible for\u00a014 per cent of all greenhouse emissions\u00a0from human activity<\/em> (Hahn, 2021).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Latex<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Latex\u00a0is a natural material, which is derived from the titular, milky white sap of the rubber tree in a process called tapping. This involves scoring its bark rather than felling the whole tree, meaning the material is rapidly renewable. Thanks to its environmental credentials, designers are increasingly using the material as a\u00a0sustainable alternative to animal- and petroleum-based materials. Fashion designers such as\u00a0Harikrishnan<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0Fredrik Tj\u00e6randsen<\/em>\u00a0used the material instead of synthetic rubber or\u00a0polyvinyl chloride (PVC)<\/strong>, while Australian designer\u00a0Molly Younger<\/em>\u00a0substituted leather for latex to create a series of\u00a0flesh-like bags. In the furniture industry, designers are combining it with natural aggregates to replace upholstery foam, which is made from polyurethane plastic and cannot be recycled (Hahn, 2021).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Concrete substitutes<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Concrete is the most widely used construction material in the world and its production is singularly responsible for\u00a0eight per cent of global CO2 emissions\u00a0every year.<\/strong> In a bid to mitigate this, material researchers have developed a range of different alternatives. One of these, called\u00a0Finite<\/em>, is made from desert sand instead of special construction-grade sand<\/em> and its\u00a0inventors’ claim\u00a0has “less than half the CO2 footprint” of concrete (Hahn, 2021).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Elsewhere, London studio Newtab-22<\/em> has created its\u00a0concrete-like Sea Stone<\/strong>\u00a0using a natural binder and waste seashells from the seafood industry, which are rich in calcium carbonate \u2013 a compound that is also used to make concrete’s key ingredient cement (Hahn, 2021).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Algae bioplastic<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bioplastic<\/strong>\u00a0has long been heralded as a possible solution to the plastic crisis. But\u00a0environmentalists have raised concerns<\/em>\u00a0that mass adoption of\u00a0polylactic acid (PLA)<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 the most common type of bioplastic, which is made from corn, sugar cane and other plants<\/strong> \u2013 would require vast amounts of farmland to produce. This would cause environmental damage and divert crucial food supplies away from the earth’s growing population. As an alternative, designers have started experimenting with bioplastic made from marine\u00a0algae<\/strong>, an abundant and renewable natural resource that captures carbon from the atmosphere throughout its life (Hahn, 2021).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Food waste<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Repurposing waste streams is a crucial step in moving towards a\u00a0circular economy<\/strong>, where materials are constantly reused and no elements are wasted. A number of designers have turned to byproducts of the food and drinks industry in particular as these offer a treasure trove of natural materials. Among the most useful ingredient are discarded seafood shells<\/strong>, which contain a biopolymer called chitin<\/strong> that designers have used to create\u00a0bioplastic packaging<\/em>\u00a0and combined with waste coffee grounds to create a\u00a0leather alternative (Hahn, 2021).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Others have repurposed slaughterhouse waste such as animal blood, skin and bones to create a\u00a0range of homeware\u00a0and\u00a0food packaging as well as a\u00a0bio-leather trainer. Similarly, fruit and vegetable leftovers have been turned into\u00a0bioplastic cups,\u00a0packaging\u00a0and leather alternatives such as\u00a0Pi\u00f1atex<\/em>, while Filipino engineer\u00a0Carvey Ehren Maigue has turned the food waste into solar panels<\/strong>\u00a0that can generate clean energy from ultraviolet light (Hahn, 2021).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cork\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cork, which is derived from the outer bark of the cork oak, is becoming increasingly popular among designers because it is compostable, recyclable and can be stripped from the tree without cutting it down, allowing the plant to continue capturing carbon. For every ton of cork produced, cork oak forests capture an estimated\u00a073 tons of CO2<\/strong>, making the material effectively\u00a0carbon negative.<\/strong> Beyond being used as\u00a0cladding\u00a0in architecture,\u00a0Jasper Morrison has turned offcuts from wine cork production into a series of furniture<\/em>\u00a0while Tom Dixon charred the material to create his “sound absorbent, fireproof, water-resistant”\u00a0Cork collection (Hahn, 2021).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bacterial nanocellulose<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another leather alternative is\u00a0bacterial nanocellulose\u00a0(BNC)<\/strong>, which is produced by a symbiotic culture of bacteria and yeast, also known as SCOBY and used to create the fermented tea drink kombucha. The material is subjected to a tanning and dyeing process to create a bio-leather that\u00a0material scientist Theanne Schiros\u00a0claims has up to a 97 per cent lower carbon footprint than synthetic\u00a0polyurethane\u00a0(PU)<\/em> leather and will degrade in a domestic compost heap in a matter of months (Hahn, 2021).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Personal note:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The proposals and projects presented in this article confirm the possibility of developing alternative materials for various applications. This facilitates the understanding of the transformation of materials into sustainable products with less environmental impact. These are exciting approaches to the current situation in the face of the climate crisis and pollution. It demonstrates how, from the design, you can contribute to change. Of course, it is required to deepen the alternatives to advance to the production stage because the projects should not remain in a conceptual stage. The important thing is to turn these proposals into something viable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hahn , J. (2021, April 4). Seven key materials designers are relying on to create more sustainable products<\/em>. Dezeen. Retrieved January 29, 2023, from https:\/\/www.dezeen.com\/2021\/04\/22\/sustainable-materials-design-earth-day\/<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We have rounded up seven\u00a0materials\u00a0that designers are using to replace more polluting mainstays such as plastic, concrete and leather in a bid to limit the impacts of\u00a0climate change. With\u00a0a recent study\u00a0finding that human-made materials now outweigh the total mass of Earth’s living biomass, designers are becoming increasingly aware of how the products they design impact […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":94,"featured_media":13609,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26,33],"tags":[60,116,105],"class_list":{"0":"post-13607","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-focus","8":"category-focus-featured","9":"tag-design","10":"tag-focus","11":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13607","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/94"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13607"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13607\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13816,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13607\/revisions\/13816"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13607"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13607"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13607"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}