Uses of Coffee Grounds: Black Coffee Grounds for Refrigerator Deodorization and Even Furniture Speakers!

Innovative Furniture Made from Recycled Coffee Grounds

A recent exhibition at MaoMa Warehouse in Shanghai's Yangpu District featured a collection of furniture made entirely from used coffee grounds. These eco-friendly pieces are built with "coffee ground circular recycled panels," developed jointly by Tongji University and Starbucks. The process blends recycled coffee grounds with other environmentally friendly materials to produce low-carbon panels that work for all kinds of furniture designs.

Coffee grounds owe their usefulness to a naturally porous structure. They absorb impurities, neutralize odors, and even have antibacterial properties. Combined with good thermal conductivity, insulation, and moisture absorption, they hold real promise in fields as varied as clothing, construction, and building materials. Their natural wood-like color gives them a warm, comfortable look, and as an organic material they have an obvious advantage in tone and texture.

Design Applications and Innovation

The exhibition was co-organized by the College of Design and Innovation at Tongji University and Covestro Polymer, with a focus on applied design for recycled coffee ground panels. As the designers studied the material and got to know its character, they unlocked a range of possibilities for this new eco-friendly material. Here are some of the standout pieces on display:

Coffee Tree Table - Aurora Innovation Center

The inspiration comes from the natural landscapes where coffee grows: tall tropical shrubs and rolling mountain forests. By tracing coffee's full journey - growing, harvesting, brewing, enjoying, and recycling - the design awakens an awareness of nature. The table comes in two heights, so it works both for sitting and working on a laptop and for standing, chatting, and letting ideas flow freely.

Tree Table - College of Design and Innovation, Tongji University, and the Material Application and Innovation Laboratory

This side table's form draws on 3D-rendered design studies and the shapes of trees in nature. To make it sturdier, the team paired coffee ground panels with plywood and sandwich panels. The dark circular recycled panels contain a higher proportion of coffee grounds - get close enough and you can catch a faint coffee aroma.

XO Tea Chair - East China University of Science and Technology

Chairs are considered the ultimate test in furniture design, and nearly every celebrated designer and architect has a signature chair. Because coffee ground panels don't take well to fine cutting, the pieces are joined with interlocking construction - which also makes the chair easy for customers to assemble themselves.

Triangle Screen - College of Design and Innovation, Tongji University

This piece uses a traditional Chinese three-way interlocking structure to give the triangular screen added stability, while the interlocking panel frames create versatile storage space.

Coffee Ground Speaker - Muha Design Company

A speaker cabinet made from plain recycled panels would have lacked visual appeal, so the design firm mixed coffee grounds with PCL (a biodegradable plastic) instead. The grounds add sound-absorbing qualities, along with an oatmeal-cookie color and a distinctive texture. Molding the mixture with PCL also opened up far more design options for the cabinet's shape.

Image source: Network

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

All of these creative reuse ideas start with one thing: freshly brewed coffee. If you want great coffee grounds for deodorizing your fridge or trying your own DIY projects, it helps to brew beans you actually enjoy first. A great entry-level choice is FrontStreet Brazil Cerrado Red Bourbon, from Brazil's famous Cerrado region. It delivers classic cream, peanut, and cocoa notes, brews smoothly and balanced, and is affordable enough to keep as a daily workhorse.

If you prefer something brighter, FrontStreet Ethiopia Guji Hambela is a wonderful everyday bean with jasmine floral notes, lemon-like acidity, and a berry character - a lovely introduction to washed Ethiopian coffee. And for those who lean toward low acidity, FrontStreet Indonesia Lindong Mandheling offers a rich, smooth, herb-and-spice cup made with the traditional wet-hulled process.