用咖啡渣制成的杯碟

German company Kaffeeform combines dried coffee grounds and biopolymer to create stylish-looking coffee cups and saucers that are not only durable and dishwasher-safe， but even smell a bit like coffee.

For every cup of coffee you brew， about two tablespoons of grounds wind up in the trash. That doesnt seem like a lot， but just think about the millions of coffees consumed around the world every single day， and youll start to see the problem. Sure， some of those coffee grounds are recycled as fertilizer or beauty products like face masks， but most of them end up at landfills. It was while contemplating this issue that German product designer Julian Lechner came up with a radical new and sustainable way of recycling coffee grounds—turning them into tableware.

Lechner first came up with the idea of using coffee grounds to create eco-friendly crockery while attending university in the Italian city of Bolzano. “We were always drinking coffee at university，” he remembers. “Before classes， after classes， meeting friends， hanging out at espresso bars—all the time. And thats how I started to wonder， what happens to all that coffee？ Is it all just getting thrown away？” He began consulting with his professors about ways of using coffee grounds to create a solid material， but it took him years to actually come up with a viable solution.

“We tried binding with a lot of different things，” Julian Lechner said. “We even tried sugar， but basically it was a candy cup. It just kept dissolving after being used three times.” The whole point was to make the material durable， so it was back to the drawing board for him and his partners at a German research institute. Finally， after many failed experiments， long nights and kilograms of coffee grounds， they came up with a mix of coffee grounds， wood grains and a biopolymer of cellulose， lignin， and natural resins that seemed to behave the way Julian had envisioned it when he first embarked on his quest.

“The moment of knowing the cup would actually stand was super-exciting，” he recalls. “After such a long time， you have to really believe in an idea and that it can eventually work. It was overwhelming to drink that first coffee out of the cup. It proved to be totally worth the wait.” And the fact that his creation has proven commercially successful is just the icing on the cake. Kaffeeform coffee cups and saucers are now present in ten shops across Europe， and the company can hardly keep up with demand， regularly selling out of its stock online. And theyve only been in business for a year.

“It basically all happened through word of mouth，” Lechner says about the success of his company. “Its amazing to think of some of the places where orders have come from. A lot of individuals， but also a café in Saudi Arabia， Ritz Carlton Toronto， and the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo to sell in their museum （gift shop）.”

Kaffeeform will soon launch a larger line of coffee grounds cups for cappuccino， and is also working on a travel mug. But those are just short-term plans， as Lechner hopes to one day use recycled coffee grounds to create all sorts of useful stuff. “Perhaps they could later be used for furniture in cafés and restaurants，” says he.

一家名為Kaffeeform的德國公司通過混合干的咖啡渣和生物高聚物，發明了一種新潮的咖啡杯和咖啡碟。這種咖啡杯套裝不僅耐用，還可以用洗碗機清洗，聞起來甚至還帶有淡淡的咖啡香。

你每泡一杯咖啡，就有兩大匙的咖啡渣被扔進垃圾桶。雖然看似剩下的量很少，但是想一下每天全世界的人要消耗數百萬杯的咖啡，咖啡渣帶來的問題就不容小覷了。的確，一些咖啡渣被回收利用，制作成肥料或是面膜類的美容產品，但是大多數的咖啡渣都被倒入了垃圾填埋場。德國產品設計師朱利安·萊希納在思考這個問題時，萌生了一個大膽新奇的、可持續回收咖啡渣的方法：將其變為餐具。

萊希納在意大利波爾扎諾上大學時提出了一個設想：利用咖啡渣做環保陶器。他回憶說：“我們上大學時每天都喝咖啡，不管是上課前、下課后、跟朋友聚會時、泡咖啡吧時，我們無時無刻不在喝咖啡。所以我就開始思考，這些剩下的咖啡渣是被怎么處理的？就只能被丟掉嗎？”他和教授們開始一起討論如何把這些咖啡渣變成堅固的材料，但是他們花了幾年才想到一個可行的辦法。

朱利安·萊希納說：“我們試著用不同的黏合劑，甚至嘗試過用糖，但是做出來基本上是一只‘糖杯，而且用了三次之后就融化了。” 讓原料變得更堅固耐用是最核心的問題，所以他和他的伙伴們又在德國一所研究所從頭開始鉆研。他們做了無數次失敗的試驗，熬了無數個漫漫長夜，在試驗中用掉了無數公斤咖啡渣后，最后終于制作出了夢寐以求的材料，這種材料由咖啡渣、木材顆粒、纖維素和木質素等生物高聚物材料以及天然樹脂混合而成。

萊希納回憶說，當得知這種杯子可以站立時，他欣喜若狂。“研究了這么長時間，你就必須得相信這個想法是可行的，而且它最終可以實現。當我喝到用這種杯子泡出來的第一杯咖啡時，內心百感交集。這么久的等待沒有白費。”錦上添花的是，他的發明還取得了商業上的成功。現在歐洲有十家實體店出售Kaffeeform咖啡杯具，但是仍然供不應求，公司的網店隔一段時間就會賣斷貨，而這些咖啡杯具才上市一年。

萊希納談到公司的成功時說道：“咖啡杯具的銷售基本上是靠口碑的。訂單來自不同的地方，有的地方的訂單真的太出乎意料了。有許多個人客戶購買，也有來自沙特阿拉伯的咖啡店和多倫多麗思卡爾頓酒店的訂單，甚至連諾貝爾和平獎的頒發地奧斯陸的博物館的禮品店都在出售Kaffeeform咖啡杯具。”

Kaffeeform公司很快將大量生產一款專門泡卡布奇諾的咖啡杯，同時它也可以用作旅行杯。但是這些都是短期計劃，萊希納希望未來能夠用可循環利用的咖啡渣來創造出各種實用物品。他說：“或許有一天咖啡渣能夠用來做咖啡館和餐館的家具呢。”