SHUCKS - Tyle - A biomaterial exploration into Scallop shells
Category: Interior
Competitions: Home Competition 2026
A piece selected from my final project at Glasgow school of Art (Product Design BDes 2026) SHUCKS is a material exploration as well as a service I have proposed that can process discarded scallop shells into valuable products and materials. This project aims to evidence the utility and value in using the 130.000 tonnes of shell waste created every year. These localised circular methodologies aim to improve the socio-economic and ecological life on the coasts of Scotland. I have selected Tyle from the SHUCKS project as it is naturally derived alternative to traditional ceramic wall tiles, Tyle also functions as a community based initiative set up to create new accessible industry for coastal communities. This toolkit allows communities to utilise the mass amounts of local shellfish waste and turn it into a profitable revenue. Providing the knowledge (recipe/method) and tools for users to process the shells-turning them into a workable material and then press market ready tiles. The kit consists of a tile mould, hardening spray and a user guide (including my recipe). The community body is then connected with a shellfish waste stream through SHUCKS, finally the user will only then need a printing press or hydraulic press to begin producing bespoke bio-degradable tiles. Reconnecting material to human (A passage from my degree show display) Our relationship with material has grown so distant that we have lost connection to our products' origins, a disconnect that allows us to ignore the environmental impact of our consumption. Shucks aims to close this gap by creating circular biomaterial production systems that utilise local bio-waste, providing the means for communities to fully engage with these loops. As demonstrated in projects Tyle and Oorn, these localised biomaterial circles challenge the product narrative, restructuring how we harvest, understand, and coexist with the materials that surround us. This project is deeply rooted in my passion for climate-driven design and the physical practice of "thinking through making." Driven by the belief that designers hold a critical responsibility to address the climate crisis, I focused my practice on sustainable material innovation. I spent the majority of this project at the bio-lab in the Haldane, iterating on recipes to develop the most ethically sourced, low-impact solutions. My work explores the viability of scallop shell waste and local material valorisation, guided by a central research question: How can the value of shellfish waste be unlocked across different environments to actively benefit the communities and ecosystems the waste exists in? Taking the idea forward I began to explore the systems that would exist around it, picturing a brand (SHUCKS) that provides new materials for communities and industries to engage with and the necessary loops to ensure the material is utilised to its full potential. https://youtu.be/3L-G4_SX5e4
