Even the most unthinkable materials can become circular.
That's what you may think once you discover that Urban Nature Culture Amsterdam’s pottery is glazed with bottom ash. Yes, the same residual bottom ash from incinerating household waste. As a matter of fact, Urban Nature Culture gives new life to second-hand tableware with Renewi Mineralz's FORZ®Glaze — glazing primarily composed of recycled resins.
Since 2016, Renewi and Urban Nature Culture have joined forces to give new life to crockery instead of throwing it away. Urban Nature Culture Amsterdam collects old pottery from thrift stores, strips it of possible irregularities, applies FORZ®Glaze with specific colour pigments, and bakes off the product. The resulting pottery is certified and, as such, completely safe to eat or drink from.
Urban Nature Culture and Renewi Mineralz’s circular pottery lowers CO2 emissions by minimising primary raw materials to create new glazing or ceramic, and reducing imports by reusing local products. The result is the first fully circular pottery in the world.
Anne Marie Hermans, Co-founder and Creative Director at Urban Nature Culture Amsterdam, joined us today to tell you more about this circular innovation.
Anne Marie
Thank you for joining us, Anne Marie. Why did Urban Nature Culture choose Renewi as a partner?
"Five years ago, I saw that there's much second-hand tableware in the market that can be refurbished and re-sold. I first started calling factories, but no one was interested in creating more circular products. After that, I switched to contacting people at the design academy in Eindhoven, and I connected with a potter who specialises in glazing: Daria Biryukova. She revealed that she was cooperating with Renewi Mineralz to create a glaze using bottom ash from incinerating household trash, and she got us in touch with them. And that's how it all started."
What type of cooperation does Urban Nature Culture have with Renewi?
"We co-signed an exclusive agreement for using the glaze on second-hand tableware worldwide. We invested a lot of money to get to where we are now, as Renewi and us both financed Daria [Biryukova, ed.] to make tests. It took three years to ensure that we could deliver the quality we promised to our clients, but we made it! We now have a small workshop, and we plan to scale it up."
How did Renewi help you in developing your project further?
"The product was innovative for both and Renewi as nothing like this exists in the world. With Renewi, we had constant (online or on-site) meetings to discuss the problems we faced and how we could move forward. Renewi was key in delivering us small batches of waste to experiment with and connecting us with potential clients from their network. They also helped us a lot in tweaking FORZ®Glaze's recipe to meet our needs. Renewi proved to be an excellent partner from start to finish."
What's coming up for Renewi and Urban Nature Culture?
"As said, it's time to scale up our small workshop to have a return of investment, and we're searching for partners to run a bigger factory. Renewi will keep a customer-supplier relationship, but we're excited to be the first two companies in the world to sell 100% circular pottery."
Share your innovative ideaAre you or your organisation interested in circularity and have an innovative solution? Do you wish to implement it at a commercial scale? At Renewi, we’d love to hear from you! Any solution is welcome, and we would love to start with those with the highest and direct impact. Can we help to scale your solution? |
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