If you’re heading to the Surface Design Show, make time for the return of Green Grads at the Business Design Centre in Islington, London. The show runs this week (3 to 5 February 2026) and registration is free.

The Green Grads have double the stand space at the show this year and 14 graduates are showing work across textiles, wall coverings, ceramics, furniture, and material innovation, aligned with the show’s Material Evolution theme.

The grads will be on the stand throughout the show.

Here is a preview of all 14.

Green Grads champions recent graduates developing creative responses to the climate and biodiversity crises, supporting early careers in sustainable design, craft, and innovation. Read more on their website.
Image of Josh Myers with Denimolite courtesy of Green Grads

Green materials

Elizabeth Lee and colleagues will represent Carbon Cell, a carbon-negative, biochar-based replacement for polystyrene and traditional-polymer foams.

Josh Myers is showing Denimolite, a robust, machinable board made from waste denim, with a blue marbled finish that never repeats.

Mobina Rajabimoghadam is presenting Biorecursive's EGSHEL biomaterials made from food waste (principally eggshells).

See the Material Source library for these and other new materials.

Green furniture

Anna Eerdmans will set up Vita Onesta, a modular furniture system designed to flex between shelving, a desk, TV stand, wardrobe and more. It’s made using natural materials such as cork, hemp and coffee grounds.

Izzy Kelly brings Fallen Furniture, proposing new value for the abundant timber felled in every locality which is often chipped or burned.

Image of a panel by Mandy Roland-Smith courtesy of Green Grads

Green textiles

Amelia Wylam creates embroidered wall hangings using silk and root fabrics coloured with natural dyes, responding to the shadows of changing sunlight.

Mandy Roland-Smith produces needle-felted panels, often dramatic in scale, working exclusively with wool sourced within a six-mile radius of her home and dyed with locally gathered plant-based dyes.

Claire Malley weaves discarded textiles into emotive artworks, giving unwanted fabric a second life through process and composition.

Image of Out of Sight by Charlette Costin courtesy of Green Grads

Green ceramics and glazes

Charlette Costin’s Out of Sight ceramics protest against industrial fishing.

Neve Beill has developed a glaze from discarded cigarette ash.

Image of Martha Lawton courtesy of Green Grads

Green messages

A number of projects sit in the space between material and message-making.

Ruwanthi Gajadeera references ocean pollution through the poetic motifs of her radiant indigo fabrics.

Martha Lawton responds to pollution in internal waterways with woven wool “paintings” using natural dyes and materials, inspired by river swimming.

Lydia Hill’s Going, Going, Gone print collection for wallpapers, fabrics and stationery highlights the UK’s diminishing butterfly species.

Salma Garana transforms the cellulose acetate from cigarette filters (combined with wool) into fibres and panels, suggesting a route for an arguably overlooked waste (trillions of tobacco filters are littered every year).

Cigarette butts: how the no 1 most littered objects are choking our coasts
An estimated 4.5tn tobacco filters are littered each year and many end up in oceans with deadly consequences
The GuardianAshifa Kassam

Read more about Green Grads and their mission on their website.

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