In Liverpool, Dirty Waste Glass Becomes Clayless Ceramic Tiles
Tile Wars · sustainability · · Tile Wars
Granby Workshop and design studio Matter at Hand have turned half a million tonnes of un-recyclable UK waste glass into a new kind of low-energy ceramic tile — fired 400°C below clay.
The UK generates nearly half a million tonnes of waste glass every year that is too contaminated with dust and debris to be melted back into new glass. Most of it ends up crushed as a low-value aggregate substitute. Liverpool-based manufacturer Granby Workshop and design studio Matter at Hand have found a far more interesting use for it: a clayless ceramic tile.
When this impure glass is heated, crystals nucleate around the contaminants, altering and strengthening the material's structure. "If you're a glassmaker, that's a flaw. But if you're making ceramic materials, it's amazing," says Matter at Hand founder Lewis Jones.
The reaction takes place at 800–850°C — roughly 400°C cooler than firing traditional clay. For an industry battered by energy costs (Denby went into administration in March 2026), that gap is potentially game-changing.
Mimicking clay's plasticity required some lateral thinking. The team uses a cellulose binder more commonly found in cake decorating to make fondant icing. Granby Workshop, which already incorporates other waste streams into its products, also rethought its manufacturing line: tiles are extruded rather than pressed, then fired in electric kilns. Waste glass even goes into the glazes.
The first major application is already commissioned. Assemble — the Turner Prize-winning collective that co-founded the workshop with Granby Four Streets CLT in 2015 — will clad its new two-storey Fourth Corner building in Toxteth with 10,000 of these tiles. It is a rare context where supportive stakeholders make experimental materials feasible, and a powerful proof point for circular construction.