London design firm Blast Studio has combined urban waste and edible fungi to 3D print a functional load-bearing architectural column that can potentially be used to construct a building in future.
Discarded coffee cups collected by the studio from around London were pulped and ‘inoculated’ with reishi – an edible fungi – to produce a 3D printable biomaterial. This was then fed into a custom extrusion-based 3D printer to shape the structural column featuring a ridged form similar to a tree trunk.
The fungi’s roots called mycelium naturally start to degrade the waste to transform it into a strong material. The folds and crevasses on the biomass column are designed to retain moisture to facilitate the growth of edible mushrooms that can be harvested as food. Once this purpose is served, the structure is dried at a high temperature to stop the development of the fungi and solidify it into a load-bearing building column.
According to the studio, the column displays strength similar to medium density fibreboard (MDF), and therefore, can be used to replace concrete in houses and small buildings. The sustainable building material can be recycled and 3D printed again at end of life.
Blast Studio aims to scale the technology to create pavilions and entire buildings in future, leading to the development of living architecture that could not only self-repair but also feed its residents.
Looking to 3D print a large Tree Pavilion by the end of the year, the studio has created the first column, The Blue Tree, made from used coffee cups dyed with a natural blue pigment and shaped into an organic trunk-like form. “This artefact is about artificial waste becoming natural again and about cardboard waste being transformed into a new kind of tree,” the studio explained.
Blast Studio is currently exhibiting a Tree Column at the Design Museum of London as part of the ‘Waste Age: what can design do?’ exhibition.
