Recycled Plastic Cladding Makes Its Debut in Holland

A Dutch design team has created wall shingles made from recycled plastic and installed them on a house.

According to Dezeen, a Dutch design team of Overtreders W and Bureau SLA have created wall shingles dubbed "Pretty Plastic" that are made from recycled PVC. The shingles have been installed on the exterior wall of a school music pavilion in Holland. The gray, diamond-shaped shingles are made from shredded PVC building products including window frames, downspouts and rain gutters. They are hung in overlapping rows from a single screw.

First developed in 2017, the tiles received fire approval in class B (very difficult to burn) last year, allowing them to be used as a cladding material on external facades. Designed by Bureau SLA and Overtreders W, the pavilion demonstrated how the principles of the circular economy could be applied to architecture, with every component designed to be used again once the structure was demounted.

The pavilion was clad in 9,000 bespoke moulded plastic shingles made of waste collected from local residents. Architects Peter van Assche of Bureau SLA and Reinder Bakker, and Hester van Dijk of Overtreders W, then developed the shingles into a commercial product.