Can waste become a viable foundation for high-performance design?

This question sits at the heart of EcoLattice’s approach, a young company experimenting with foams that are 3D-printed from recycled thermoplastic elastomers (TPEs). Their ambition is to prove that sustainability does not have to compromise performance and that materials once seen as byproducts can instead become structural building blocks for industries as diverse as healthcare, automotive, and interior design.

Why Now?

Foam is everywhere; in seating, mattresses, medical supports, packaging, yet rarely considered critically by designers. Conventional foams often rely on petroleum-based polymers, are difficult to recycle, and usually end up in landfill. The global urgency around circularity and carbon reduction places new pressure on such ubiquitous but underexamined materials. EcoLattice positions itself in this context: founded in 2023, it aims to develop foams that are not only recyclable but also customisable, long-lasting, and tailored to industry-specific needs.

When waste is reimagined as structure, design gains a new language for durability, adaptability, and responsibility.

Design Implications

EcoLattice’s material choice is notable: recycled TPEs provide flexibility, impact absorption, and durability. Claimed benefits include a 20-year lifespan, UV and fire resistance, and ease of cleaning, aligning with current design debates around repairability and lifecycle extension.

The production method is equally relevant. Additive manufacturing allows zero-waste fabrication and enables lattice geometries impossible in traditional foam moulding. Designers gain the ability to customise density, hardness, and shape, potentially linking ergonomic data to digital manufacturing for responsive furniture, automotive seating, or healthcare supports.

In terms of form, these 3D-printed lattices expand aesthetic and functional possibilities. Furniture could integrate visible lattice structures as part of its design language; healthcare designers might create posture supports optimised for individual patients.

Takeaway for Designers

For designers, EcoLattice is a reminder that even the most overlooked materials can be reimagined. Foam, often treated as disposable, is here reframed as durable, adaptable, and high-performing. This shift suggests a broader opportunity: to see waste not as a limitation but as a design resource.

By linking advanced manufacturing with ecological responsibility, EcoLattice points toward a future where sustainability and performance are not in conflict but in conversation. For practitioners, the message is simple yet powerful: rethinking everyday materials can open new possibilities for form, function, and impact

EcoLattice’s Beyond Foam exhibition in London (ARAM Store, 2025) suggests the company is testing these boundaries, presenting the material both as an industrial solution and as a site for speculative design. For designers, this dual framing is critical: it signals that foam can be more than hidden filler, it can also be an expressive and systemic material.