Stockholm, Sweden

Street furniture brand Vestre and Swedish designer Emma Olbers have partnered to design this fossil-free steel bench, the Tellus, a seating solution “was made without creating carbon emissions” and because of this, it has vast implications for the future of sustainable design.

The bench itself was forged by the Swedish steelmaker SSAB who utilizes green hydrogen instead of coal in the manufacturing process.

“Early estimates show that converting all our steel to fossil-free could reduce our overall footprint by around 60 percent,” says Vestre Chief Sustainability Officer Øyvind Bjørnstad.

According to Emma Olbers, the main goal was to diminish emissions even further by using as little material as possible to make the bench.

Even though SSAB’s alloy is forged without coal, there are still carbon emissions elsewhere in the value chain, such as from mining and transport, so every gram of material still has some carbon cost.

“An outdoor bench for public environments must also withstand a lot of wear and tear,” explains Emma Olbers.

“We have striven to use as little material as possible but still maintain the strong construction.”

Project: Tellus Bench
Designer: Emma Olbers
Manufacturer: Vestre
Photographers: Einar Aslaksen