Sunday's tale: Bottle Masonry. Made house with recycled plastic bottles

Sunday's Tale: a post from the past

On Sustainable diary last Sunday we spoke about an amazing building made with glass bottles, and also today we decide to tell a bottle’s story.

Plastic bottle construction is an idea of Andreas Froese, an architect and environmental entrepreneur. Froese developed Eco-Tec, a method to utilize plastic (PET) bottles as “bricks” in the construction of houses, latrines, and water tanks. It is a good idea to address the problem by putting to use some of the million plastic water bottles discards each day in developing nations.

The first plastic bottle construction project in Africa was pioneered in Uganda by an organization called Butakoola Village Association forDevelopment - BUVAD. BUVAD is located in Kayunga, a district north of Kampala.

They teamed up with Eco-Tec to bring bottle construction technology to Uganda in the form of a latrine block. Students and community members at a local primary school collected and filled bottles found throughout the community and together they built a block of latrines for their school. Constructed in April 2010, BUVAD’s latrine block was the first of its kind on the continent.

Benefits of Bottle Construction

Waste management - A small house can use as many as 10,000 bottles, waste that would otherwise be deposited in a landfill or burned.

Environmental protection - Unlike “traditional” bricks, bottle bricks are not fired, a process which uses much firewood and contributes to deforestation.

Cost effective - Building with bottles is typically less expensive than building with bricks as the main construction material is trash.

Job creation – The construction process of building with bottles is work intensive. This means many can be involved in the process, creating opportunities for employment and community involvement, from collecting to filling to building. While this method would potentially be costly in more industrialized nations, where labor is expensive and materials are cheap, in countries like Uganda, materials are expensive, labor is cheap, and jobs are in demand.

Shock resistant – The plastic coating of “bottle bricks” makes them more flexible than fired bricks. Bottle construction has greater shock resistance and is well suited for earthquake prone areas.

Long lasting – It is estimated that it takes a plastic bottle approximately 300 years to decompose.

Here you can have a tutorial, and here you can find some inspirations.

More info

website Eco-Tec

facebook page

Photo credit © Aminu Abubakar

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Sunday's tale: the Thai Temple of recycled beer bottles

Sunday's Tale: a post from the past

In the Thai landscape, Buddhist temples are very common sight.

Deep in Sisaket province, in the north-east of Thailand, lies one incredible temple complex. Its official name is Wat Pa Maha Chedi Kaew but it is known by almost everyone as Wat Lan Kuad or the Temple of a Million Bottles. 

There’s an estimated 1.5 million bottles bound in concrete into the temple. It is a novel way to recycle any empties.

The construction of this temple complex began in 1984, as the monks found themselves with an excess of donated beer bottles that they previously used just to decorate existing buildings.

The resident Buddhist monks at the complex encourage local authorities to deposit any used bottles at the temple which they then use to build new structures and works of art to the grounds of the temple. "The more bottles we get, the more buildings we make", says Abbot San Kataboonyo. Everything on the temple site, from the crematorium to the toilets, incorporates the bottles, making a space that’s both functional and beautiful. Bottle caps have been used to decorate murals, and to create mosaics of Buddha.

The monks have come to prefer the bottles over traditional red clay bricks as they don’t fade and produce a fantastic colored ambient light. They primarily use green and brown glass bottles from the beer brands Heineken and Chang. Some of the older buildings in the complex are created with rare square shaped Heineken bottles that are easily stackable and were briefly sold in the 80′s. Perhaps that is where the idea for bottles as bricks was originally conceived.

Even though drinking is a sin in Buddhism, this still seems like a positive use of beer and lager bottle. So, if you find yourself in Thailands Sisaket province consider stopping by and earning some merit. Or at least just enjoy a cold beer and donate your bottle to the effort!

 

 

 

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A poetic concept: making bikes from junked cars

The Spanish design studio Lola Madrid, owned by creative agency Lowe & Partners, has launched few days ago the platform LOLA Hace (LOLA Make), in order to design and manufacture products that make life easier for people or emotionally in touch with them. The first product that they have conceived is Bicycled.

Bicycled is new making bikes project that utilizes recycled cars as the main source for material. It is such a poetic concept, fewer cars and more bikes is a probably a dream for cyclists everywhere, in an effort to create the most efficient, ecological and healthy means of transportation.

Even though the line is not yet complete, Lola Madrid has just launched a video about the process of transformation and creation of models: the exclusive use of car wrecks different gives a unique look to any bike, which makes anyone proud owns one! Each hand-made bike is based on a consumer insight - which reflects on the emotional attachment from wrecked vehicles. Body metal is used for the bike frame, brake lights turn into reflectors, door handles become seat post clamps and so on.

Bicycled looks like a great way to give cars a second life, while also reducing the demand for new material for bikes. Add in that each creation is closer to art than a mass produced product and they seem to have a winning combination.

More info

website Bicycled

website Lola Madrid

Facebook page

Photo credit © Lola Madrid

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Create without destroying: Carmina Campus, a fashion sustainable initiative

These are the days of the Milan Fashion Week, one of the things that has attracted the attention of Sustainable diary is Carmina Campus, a collection of handbags, jewels and furniture successfully combining the idea of ethical fashion and sustainable eco-friendly, with the great traditional Italian craftsmanship.

The brand was founded in 2006 by Ilaria Venturini Fendi, who explains "With Carmina Campus I tried to fashion a new approach, enriching the body of knowledge derived from my family history with values such as respect for the environment and the implementation of work projects aimed at social development"

The creations included in the collections are under the sign of reuse and upcycle, as Carbags line, bags made with seat covers, sun screens, safety belts recovered from car in shambles. Over the years the collection Carmina Campus made in Italy has been enriched by new materials. So switches are turned into sparkling Switch Bag and bottle caps become closures for Pyramid Bag, bags reversible with an inlay made of small pieces of leather processed in a pyramid. And then there are the old color charts, which take the form of soft Soft Bag.

While the items of the collection 100% made in Africa, successfully making concrete the philosophy “not charity, just work”. In Kenia Carmina Campus has given rise to the Ethical Fashion Initiative. The project has seen the involvement of some employees of craftsmen who have passed on their know-how to local communities through a process of training on site. So the brand has launched social projects that have the objective of training microentrepreneurs, promoting education and health care. The iniative was born from the collaboration of Carmina Campus with ITC (International Trade Centre), an agency of the UN and the World Trade Organization, whose mission is to provide developing countries opportunities for training and work.

More info

website Carmina Campus

Facebookpage

Photo credit © Carmina Campus

 

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Upcycled Playground in Malawi's hospital by Sakaramenta

Sakaramenta is a social enterprise producing push and bicycle carts.

It is based in Blantyre, Malawi, and founded in 2009. Sakaramenta produces 5 different carts to transport patients, goods and other supplies behind the bicycle. The bicycle cars are designed according to high Dutch quality standards, at the moment 21 people are employed.

The reason to start up this business, is a believe in creating employment, stimulating entrepreneurship and local production in the best of way of bringing development to a country.

Getting things from A to B is not always easy in Malawi. The weather, shortage of fuel and quality of roads make carrying goods and people a though job. Sakaramenta takes the challenge to solve these problems.

Furthermore they make play ground, school and hospital equipment. Like glides, swings, school desks, trolleys. The focus point are: simple, strong and sustainable. All the parts can be maintained locally. Them workshop is in Blantyre, experienced and well educated staff are making high quality products.

The last project is born from an idea by Peter Meijer, founder and managing director of Sakaramenta. He has created a kids' playground on the site of a local hospital.

The simply wonderful intervention considers its site, introducing a scrapped ambulance, repurposing it as a playground clubhouse, with an integrated - where children patients (and grown-ups) can play having a fun together. Independent research concludes that playgrounds are among the most important environments for children outside the home. Most forms of play are essential for healthy development, but free, spontaneous play—the kind that occurs on playgrounds—is the most beneficial type of play.

More info

www.sakaramenta.com

photo credit Sakaramenta

 

 

 

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Baguette table by Studio Rygalik

Two days ago was pubblished a post about the start-up Culinary Misfits, today take again the topic "food waste" with Studio Rygalik of Warszawa, Poland.

They realized a new project, the starting point is a statistical fact: food thrown away in Vienna could feed half of the population of Graz. This was presented for the first time at the Vienna Design Week.

"It was also to show that the materials to build from are all around us. The tables were made from stale baguettes that were supposed to be thrown away".

These bread structures were part of a "bread experience" created by Gosia and Tomek Rygalik, the founders of the Studio, at the Design Week Laboratory, where people were surrounded by bread, eating bread dishes from bread tables.

In their series of "Baguette tables", they cut the french bread to varying lengths, their exposed ends leveled to create the table tops, the longer pieces providing support and stability, functioning as multiple legs, as well as providing some tasty, visual appeal.

Studio Rygalik aims to develop a wide variety of limited edition projects for companies, that maintain a good balance between the commercial and the experimental.

Studio Rygalik develops a wide variety of comprehensive projects. The focus is on furniture, products and spaces. The scope is wide – from design, development and implementation of new products to site-specific installations and production of limited editions, as well as objects, dining experiences and workshops that explore the relations of design, food and eating.

More info:

www.studiorygalik.com

www.viennadesignweek.at

photo credits © Nick Albert /Kollektiv Fischka

 

 

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