Maximum's Upcycled 'Billex' Process Turns Discarded Bank Notes into Furniture

"Banque de France, a central money-producing outfit in Europe, has adopted a technology called EverFit, which includes a polymer coating on cotton-blend notes that increases durability. Every year, up to three billion notes may be printed, but they must adhere to the strictest standards of technical quality. If they don't, they're shredded. One drawback, though, is that they're not recyclable."

"Maximum's unique line of stools, called Billex, repurposes the masses of discarded bills into modern, functional objects. With a cotton substrate and two layers of plastic coating, the tiny fragments can be manipulated with heat and compressed into a hard shape. Not only is the stool a useful and stylish design piece unto itself, produced in a variety of colors, but the Billex concept is also something of a prototype."

"It can be employed for a wide range of applications, as the shredded notes-and the stools themselves-can be upcycled and compressed into virtually any shape."

Banque de France produces up to three billion banknotes annually using EverFit technology, which applies polymer coating to cotton-blend notes for increased durability. Notes failing quality standards are shredded and cannot be recycled through conventional means. Paris-based furniture design studio Maximum identified this waste stream as an opportunity for innovation. The studio developed Billex, a line of stools created by compressing shredded banknote fragments using heat. The cotton substrate and plastic coating layers allow the material to be manipulated into hard, functional shapes. Available in multiple colors, Billex stools serve as both practical furniture and a prototype demonstrating broader upcycling potential for shredded currency and other applications.

Read at Colossal