“The People’s Pavilion is designed to promote the value of a closed-loop, or “circular”, construction system, which involves thinking beyond the life of the building, so that little or no waste is produced as a result.”

– Dezeen 27 October 2017

People’s Pavilion won the Frame Awards in category Sustainable Design, The Dutch Design Awards in the category Habitat, and the ARC18 Innovation Award. People’s Pavilion is nominated for the New Material Award and the ARC18 innovation award. People’s Pavilion is published in the Dutch Yearbook of Architecture 2017/2018.

The pavilion is a design statement of the new circular economy, a 100% circular building where no building materials are lost in construction. The designers of bureau SLA and Overtreders W have accomplished this with a radical new approach: all of the materials needed to make the 250 m2 building are borrowed. Not only materials from traditional suppliers and producers, but also from Eindhoven residents themselves. And to be clear, it’s not 70% or 80% or even 95%, but 100% of the materials: concrete and wooden beams, lighting, facade elements, glass roof, recycled plastic cladding, even the Pavilion’s glass roof, all of which will be returned completely unharmed – with one special exception – to the owners following the DDW.

The exception? The striking colored tiles that make up the Pavilion’s upper facade, made from plastic household waste materials collected by Eindhoven residents, will be distributed among those very residents at the end of DDW. 100% borrowed means a construction site without screws, glue, drills or saws. This, in turn, leads to a new design language: the People’s Pavilion reveals a new future for sustainable building: a powerful design with new collaborations and intelligent construction methods.

Facts & figures

design: bureau SLA & Overtreders W
designers: Peter van Assche, Hester van Dijk, Reinder Bakker
client: Dutch Design Foundation
structural engineering: Arup
urban Mining advies: New Horizon
main builder: Ham & Sybesma, Amsterdam

Material Lenders

foundation piles: IJB groep, Lemmer
wood, steel mats: Stiho group, Nieuwegein
facade tiles: Govaerts, Hasselt (B)
ground floor facade: Tetris, Amsterdam
electrical wiring & lights: Elektroned
glass roof: DEGO, Monster
concrete flooring: Heezen, Eindhoven
tensioning straps: Logistiek Concurrent
containers for plastic waste: Van Happen, Eindhoven
plastic washing/shreddering: Morssinkhof, Haaksbergen
church benches: Keizersgrachtkerk, Amsterdam

PrettyPlastic is for sale via the Pretty Plastic website