Work has commenced on an innovative makeover at the University of Brighton's Waste House.

Situated in the grounds of the University's City Campus, the Waste House is a live, ongoing research project and permanent design workshop focused on enabling open discussion and understanding of sustainable development. 

The Waste House is made up almost entirely from thrown away materials most of which were heading for landfill sites or incineration.


The makeover will incorporate innovative new recycled and reused materials into its structure.

They include old duvets from the University's halls of residence that are being used as insulation and discarded oyster shells from English's Oyster Bar in central Brighton that have been ground down, mixed with waste aggregates from the local Preston Barracks development site, and turned into wall tiles.

Speaking about the latest modifications to the Waste House, Duncan Baker-Brown said: "It is great to see the Waste House continuing to break new ground four years after it was first completed. Duvets and oyster shells are not currently widely recycled yet, like so many of the other materials we have used, are perfectly suited to alternative uses. We will now be testing how they perform so that we can demonstrate to others the huge potential."

(CM)