Circular economy experiential learning in a domestic lab. From coffee grounds to coffee boards

Worldwide, an increasing number of Architecture Schools is investing in new teaching models, considering the learning by doing approach and the hands-on prototyping activities important features of their educational path. This method is strongly promoted by the research team of Architectural Technology at the Politecnico di Torino, which conducts experiences in collaboration with the Innovative Technological Systems Lab for years. Particularly, many experimental activities have been done as part of master’s degrees thesis and they are aimed at analysing and prototyping new materials and/or innovative architectural elements characterized by processes which favor environmental sustainability, reuse, recycle ad life cycle design. The article describes the results of a master’s thesis developed during Covid-19 pandemic period, highlighting that it is possible to conduct an experimental activity in a crisis period too, by transforming the house into a domestic lab. More specifically the research aims to find a system to recycle and re-use spent coffee grounds in an architectural context investigating how a circular loop can be developed around coffee: from brewing a drink in the kitchen, through collecting and upcycling the produced waste, to re-utilizing it in the same domestic environment in a form of a new material. Through an analytical approach, based on literature data, and an experimental approach conducted on appropriate technologies to the context, prototypes of coffee boards as building materials were developed. The paper discusses the methodology adopted in the research and the results achieved in the experimentation.