Designers Jonas Edvard and Nikolaj Steenfatt have created a new material made from seaweed and recycled paper waste as part of a project called Terroir.
Tough and durable, the material is described as a “warm and tactile surface with the softness of cork and the lightness of paper”. The designers note that the colour of the material can be selected based on the species of seaweed used.
Harvesting seaweed along Denmark’s 8000 km coastline, the designers created by material by drying the seaweed, grounding it into a powder then cooking it into a glue.
With the material, the designers have created a chair and a collection of lamps.
“The first thing people do is to smell the object,” said Edvard in an interview with Dezeen. “They just stick their nose into the material, like having a breath of fresh air. After realising it is made from seaweed people are very excited that something considered useless and smelly can be used to create sustainable furniture.”
“For the design of the Terroir lamps and the Terroir chair we wanted to create a fundamental shape and silhouette, which gave focus to the new material showing the surface and colour available,” explained Edvard. “We wanted to express the moulding abilities that the material had, by making soft curved shapes allowing for maximum strength and minimum weight.”
“Our interest in seaweed came from everyday encounters” noted Edvard. “When walking along the beach or taking a swim in the summer, you quickly face the problem of seaweed. [But] when it dries up on the beach it becomes super hard and strong.”
“We wanted to use this abundant material in a way it hadn’t been used before,” added Edvard.
