The furniture industry plays an important role in the Italian economy and represents a considerable portion of global trade, being one of the world’s leading exporters. With reference to the production and consumption of furniture in Europe, according to Eurostat, Italy is the most important producer of furniture, as well as the most significant in terms of value (17.5 billion euros). In particular, according to data provided by Federlegnoarredo, after the pandemic, the upholstered furniture sector shows steady growth, both in the domestic market and in exports, registering a +13% over the previous year in 2022, of which about 7,6% related to apparent internal consumption. However, the upholstered furniture category is one of the most impactful in terms of circularity because the final product uses very different and almost always non-recyclable materials, plus non-reversible assembly systems and there isn\u2019t a specific disposal chain (in 2017, the environmental impact of furniture waste in the EU28 was 10,78 million tonnes, and about 2,5 tons are composed by mattresses and upholstered furniture). As well, according to Europur, Europe’s upholstered furniture is disposed of in the generic municipal solid waste or “bulky” chain. The necessary circular renewal of upholstered furniture entails the implementation of new design solutions to reduce the impact of upholstered furniture, implementing a holistic approach (typically of design as a discipline) that involves all the constituting elements and related construction and assembly processes. In particular, Circular Sofa Platform aims to design and implement a new version of upholstered furniture, working on all its parts to encourage: (i) the selection and use of circular materials and raw materials for the various components; (ii) the functional designing of alternative components to reduce or eliminate the consumption of materials that are hardly recyclable; (iii) the definition of a modular system to facilitate the assembly and disassembly of all components; (iv) the use of smart, biobased and bioinspired solutions; (v) the integration of B2B and B2C services; and (vi) all of these to extend the lifespan and reduce the energy footprint of the final product. In detail, the systemic project involves the intervention on: <\/p>\n\n\n\n
1. the replacement of polyurethane foam through the development of a new auxetic geometric structure with inherent and controllable flexibility, made of biobased or recycled material (POLIMI task); <\/p>\n\n\n\n
2. the redesign of the base that hosts the upholstered part, to encourage configurability\/customization and extension, as well as assembly and disassembly, working on the selection of alternative materials and from certified supply chains (UNIBO task); <\/p>\n\n\n\n
3. the expansion of the textile upholstery catalog, through the use of natural fibrous material or fibrous waste resulting from various production chains, for the development of new textile materials with low environmental impact, according to a systemic design approach. These will be tested in virtual\/physical labs, to boost social enterprises active in textile and textile repair, as well as in the reuse and recycling of natural fibers (POLITO task)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
4. the development of alternative leather (animal and vegetable) coverings, which are based on the recovery and recycling of processing waste and using sustainable processes for tanning and dyeing (UNIFI task).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"parent":0,"template":"","class_list":["post-3072","projects","type-projects","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n