Demand growing for eco-friendly interiors, says Yorkshire firm

The founder behind a Yorkshire-based sustainable interiors firm has said that demand is growing UK-wide for more environmentally friendly means of fitting out commercial spaces.

Ashleigh Brumpton founded West Yorkshire firm BB Designs in 2022, focussing on sustainable interior design and providing bespoke furniture made from reclaimed materials.

After working with a string of local firms, the company has recently worked with its first national chain. It comes, according to Ms Brumpton, as businesses across the UK are beginning to work towards more sustainable ways of fitting out their sites.

“I'm seeing more and more companies explore circularity and start to incorporate it into their product offering,” she said.

“I’m seeing companies that are taking good initiatives now to actively reclaim materials, like property developers, who are under pressure to reduce their waste. So that’s a big driver.”

BB Designs is amongst a string of major organisations including British Land which are working to guide developers in more sustainable directions.

British Land last year launched a sustainability brief for office fit outs, designed to accelerate progress in the sector. The firm’s head of sustainability said at the time the brief had been driven by “growing understanding around the sustainability impact of office fit out and the increasing demand from ESG conscious customers”.

According to the group, fitting out a commercial space contributes over 60 per cent of the whole life embodied carbon emissions of a building.

Amongst the suggestions put forward by British Land in its brief are for companies to prioritise using existing materials and products, and the use of materials passports – a set of data which show the origin of products.

After receiving funding from Innovate UK, BB Designs recently set up its own product passport scheme, developing a system to laser etch QR codes into its furniture which allow people to view the lifecycle assessment and carbon output of the products.

While Ms Brumpton welcomed the national push to adopt sustainable practices in commercial spaces, she also warned that smaller companies could be forced out of the sector if care is not taken.

“My worry about it is that bigger businesses could monopolise the strategy and reduce the accessibility for other businesses,” she said.

“If this operational strategy goes really well, and all these big companies decide to take it up, I do think that it will definitely feed down the chain, but the resource might become a bit harder to get hold of, and it’ll push up the price of the second-hand resources.

“If that’s the case, smaller companies will wonder how they can compete. I’m hoping it wouldn’t get to that, because it makes no sense to say that you’re doing something that’s good for the environment and then only allow a certain few people to have access to that operation.

“There’s a lot of operational strategies that need to be improved upon to be able to make this accessible to lots of different companies.”

Ms Brumpton also noted, however, that smaller manufacturers could have an advantage in terms of how quickly they can adopt changes in demand. Speaking on why she believed the shift had come through in recent years, she added: “I do think there’s been a change in perspective.

“I think as a new generation grows older, they’ve got their own thoughts, feelings, and values that have been influenced by what’s actually going on in the world, and I think that mid-30s are now coming into that area of management and leadership where they can influence things.

“I think that’s really coming through as a human urge to want to do something good. But I also think that the Government’s guidelines and European pressure for climate change overall is pushing into this idea of ‘we need to sort this out, there is too much waste’.”

It comes after BB Designs recently completed a project with national chain Gail’s Bakery, creating furniture including a bench, box seats and a large baker’s table from reclaimed oak, pine and douglas fir.

BB Designs has also won a string of awards since its launch, including the Future Earth Award at this year’s Climb Awards and Manufacturing StartUp of the Year at the StartUp Awards for North-East, Yorkshire and the Humber in 2023.