Post by Telesilla Bristogianni

Last week I had the real pleasure of graduating 5 of my incredibly talented MSc students, all of whom explored how challenging waste streams can be recycled or reused to create new architectural components! In recycling: Moritz Roßdeutscher developed compositions for reproducible compressed earth blocks from Rotterdam excavation soil, he identified how key production parameters influence the mechanical performance and produced bricks of a compressive strength of up to 7.51 MPa! (Mentors: Telesilla Bristogianni, Marcel Bilow) Thaleia - Pelagini Kalfa worked with an unconventional waste stream: post-consumer sanitary waste. She developed optimal slip casting compositions using waste from toilets to produce recycled porcelain tiles for architectural applications. She then performed a perception study to prove that societal bias can prevent the recycling of this valuable porcelain source. (Mentors: Telesilla Bristogianni, Alessandra Luna Navarro) Kayla Plada Sanchez raised awareness over the tons of Dutch wool that get incinerated every year. She developed a tunable acoustic panel consisting of a knitted textile layer, loose wool infill and a strategically positioned air cavity. Her system can be adjusted to target specific frequency ranges while maintaining a lower CO₂ footprint than conventional fossil-based acoustic panels. (Mentors: Telesilla Bristogianni, Marcel Bilow) In reuse: Thanasis Svarnas developed a Scalable Process for Self-Supported Architectural Components made from reused wind turbine blades. He went on to identify the logistical, legislation, and technical barriers and test the compressive strength of such blades, proving that with only 2 turbines, it is possible to create a ventilated façade for a medium-sized office building, achieving CO₂ emissions savings of 65–96%! (Mentors: Telesilla Bristogianni, Jelle Joustra, advisor: Angeliki Christoforidou)   Last but certainly not least, Julia van Beek redesigned the mullion-transom connection of typical extruded aluminum curtain wall systems, proposing alternative connection designs that minimize or eliminate damage to the visible parts of the aluminum profiles. This preserves their structural and aesthetic value while enabling disassembly and reuse beyond the façade’s end of life. (Mentors: Ulrich Knaack, Telesilla Bristogianni) You can find their work in the TU Delft Repository. Many congratulations to all of them! I am very proud and looking forward to their next steps and achievements!