Tile | Trash to Tile, ‘Trashpresso’ Transforms Plastic into Futuristic Tiles

MILAN––Making the rounds at this year’s Milan Design Week (April 17 – 22, 2018) is the futuristic Trashpresso––the world’s first portable recycling plant that transforms trash into tiles. Unlike its energy- (and money-) guzzling municipal counterparts, the 40-foot Trashpresso is self-sustaining; using solar power to fuel its operations and leaves a zero water footprint.

Behind the Trashpresso is the company Miniwiz and its so-called Trash Lab. The company strives, it writes, to de-stigmatize trash by “unlocking the upcycling potential of this abundant but deeply damaging resource.”

It’s in the trash that we trust. Because trash equals possibility.  The possibility of a circular and sustainable economy and a cleaner, brighter future for us and the generations to follow – but only if we learn how to work with it, rather than discard it. And in order to learn, first, we must get to know it, and intimately.

The Trashpresso works by first shredding PET plastic, which is then washed, dried, dehumidified and finally baked into hexagonal molds. As DesignBoom writes, the process yields durable, weather resistant architectural tiles.

The trashpresso has impressed audiences in Beijing, London and China’s Tibetan plateau, with its ability to upcycle up to 50kg of waste per hour.

 

Watch this video of the Trashpresso in action.

You can check out other projects at Miniwiz here.