Plastic Surgery: Kevin McCloud on how to design homes without damaging our planet at Grand Designs Live 2018

Kevin McCloud is on stage talking about poo. He’s regaling the audience with the revelation that scientists in Canada have discovered an algae that can turn faeces into plastic.

The scientists are working with NASA to create a 3D printer that could, theoretically, be used to create tools in space. And the process starts with an astronaut using the toilet.

The technology is not quite there yet.

But closer to home we are already making huge strides in plastic use, as McCloud reveals on the Grand Designs Live stage in a talk on "Plastic Surgery" for the home.

Sir David Attenborough’s Blue Planet II may have created the platform for the plastic issue but, with a long history of championing sustainable design, McCloud is more than qualified to preside over the conversation.

He’s joined by Adam Fairweather from Smile Plastics, who transforms the likes of recycled yoghurt pots into a marble-like material that is lightweight and sound absorbing — the perfect splashback for the bathroom or for tabletops for trendy restaurants such as Hoxton's Cub.

Then there’s Vanessa Yuan, founder of Eco-birdy, which creates colourful children’s furniture from broken or unwanted plastic toys.

Not only are these funky chairs and rhino-shaped lights made from recycled materials, crucially, they are also totally recyclable when they come to the end of their life, too.

Craftsman James Micheal Shaw is also on stage, talking about how the market for his unique, handmade tables and door handles are a clientele who would normally opt for polished marble or brass.

REDEFINING PLASTICS

McCloud reveals that we now have enough materials in the UK to create every product we could ever possibly need.

Yet, currently, only nine per cent of plastics is recycled.

“The likes of plastic bags and cotton buds only make up a third of the plastic waste in our ocean,” says Craig Bennett, CEO of Friends of the Earth, partners for this year’s Grand Designs.

A significant 18 per cent of plastic in the sea comes from vehicle tires; nine per cent from the fibres of synthetic clothing when we wash our clothes and five per cent from cigarettes.

Did you even know there was plastic in cigarettes? Or that, because of our waste streams, we’re now irrigating farmers’ fields with plastic as well as water?

It’s been well documented that a third of the fish we eat in Britain has plastic particles in it, but we are in the very early days of really understanding the effects plastics are having on our health, says Bennett.

He argues that we ultimately need to move away from using plastics altogether - but that seems about as far away as creating plastic from human waste.

The trick for now, they all agree, is that we need to re-imagine how we think about plastics.

As founder of Cub, Ryan Chetiyawardana, recenty said: “Plastic is the stuff of science fiction. It’s the only thing that will never perish and we throw it away instantly.”

We need to have more appreciation for the process of making plastic how and reassess what we desire as consumers.

We’re used to seeing plastic in a model form, but it's time to move past that — in the same way that we now appreciate recycled paper will have a more earthy hue rather than being a brilliant white; or how we are learning to like our vegetables a lot more organic and a little bit more wonky.

Have you ever seen a plastic chandelier? The idea sounds somewhat absurd. Yet, that’s exactly what’s hanging in pride of place in the centre of the home-building exhibition, created by Stella Corall from recycled bottle tops collected at the London ExCeL.

It's a shimmering example of how all our waste can be transformed into treasure.

Friends of the Earth’s have launched Plastic Free Fridays. You can sign up here.