Creating Sustainable Homeware with Up-cycled Ceramics

BENTU product design revitalizes old ceramic materials to create sustainable modern furniture. This kind of up-cycled furniture not only directly reduces man-made environmental impact, but it also creates homeware with much greater purpose and meaning. This allows you to feel more gratitude for your home and the things within it, building a greener life is said to bring a stronger feelings of contentment.

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There is a vast environmental concern for pollution in China from ceramic waste bearing around 4 million tons of wastage per year. Bentu’s project attempts to tackle the issue by recycling ceramic waste and converting the materials into sustainable furniture for people’s homes. The Terrazzo Project stemmed from seeking out alternative methods for the discarded trash and was put on display at the Salone Satellite in 2017, a showcase for young, promising designers. If Bentu had not come across this ceramic waste, it would have been transferred to remote villages to be dumped illegally or left to pollute ponds. As the materials are non-degradable, nature us unable to break it down, leaving it to poison the growth of vegetation and the lands as we know it.

The project focused on material regeneration, to use wasted ceramic tiles to make terrazzo and put them back into the public market for everyday use. A sustainable practice which could be adopted on a large scale. The idea lends itself to our human need to consume and for products to survive. A bold attempt that stimulates the commercial value merged with the need for environmental protection in our daily lives. The process adheres to the principles of Kintsugi that nothing is ever truly broken, and repairing 'damaged' items allows you to embrace its flaws and imperfections. This grants a new lease on life to pottery that evolves to become even more refined!

Organise your living space with a simple and easy-to-clean shelves from this ceramic regeneration collection. The styles are as minimal as they are practical, the epitome of simplicity.

This slender ceramic shelving unit is a standout design, adding statement to your room whilst providing stylish storage solutions that works well in any space.

This handcrafted and glazed multi-purpose table can be used as an intimate dining table or a side table. Incredibly useful to have around your home as it is both durable and subtle in appearance.

Creating change for the way the porcelain is disposed of improves the utilisation of the material. Craftsmanship of the grid structure is paramount as it reduces the overall weight but ensures the panel is still rigid using high performing concrete as thin as 5mm.

The Bentu ceramic bench exhibits a sense of unrestrained creativity in a minimalist, sleek industrial design. These stunning handmade bars provide a contemporary finish that would take pride of place in any stylish home.

These planetary ceramic lights are out of this world, they encapsulates an extraordinary balancing act of expression with a sleek, smooth lighting art.

The Bentu Project identifies that material regeneration is the most profound way to care for the planet in future. Materials are substantial in what makes up the world, which calls for a measurement of care in how they are handled. Bentu has cleverly demonstrated how we can upcycle ceramics, crafting them into iconic minimal chairs, tables, benches, and lighting to delight the world once more.