Do you provide free quotes?

Yes, if you want we can give you an estimate or a quote if we have enough detail, just email us at info@empatlka.com some rough dimensions and a sketch and ideally some pictures of the area you have in mind and you will get a quote very quickly by email. If you are happy with the estimate then we can come and visit you when it suits you and talk in detail.

How reliable are your carpenters?

We are very reliable, stick to start times and days agreed, we do what we say we will do, we turn up on time every day in order not disrupt your schedule. And we are there throughout the job, not disappearing for one day to do something else.

Do you provide drawings?

Yes once we receive your deposit, we provide you with a hand drawn from scratch 3D computer scale drawing precise to the millimetre for you to check how it looks and to see if you are happy with the dimensions. If you like you can make any changes until the drawing is perfect.

How do I know you will do a good job?

Before I buy anything I read reviews so I suggest you do the same, we have over 100 independent testimonials on the internet. Please have a look at our testimonial page to see what our clients say about us

You call or email us, we asses your needs and give you an estimate or quote, then we arrange a time to come round and visit you, ask you more questions in detail to find out exactly what you would like, listen very carefully to your ideas and offer design ideas and solutions to best use your space and needs. We go away, email you a final quote. Once you decide to go ahead, we take a small deposit, then send you the drawings, once you have agreed the drawing we can book your place in the diary and we agree a start date. We then turn up with the materials and tools and build your units, then once built we paint them or oil them. Then once we are totally finished and you are delighted, only then do you pay us the balance, lastly if you feel testimonials have helped you choose us, please help us keep them fresh and leave us a testimonial here: https://plus.google.com/101927655300158702077/about?hl=en&review=1

Are you going to make a big mess in our house?

We understand that your home is precious and we do everything we can to make sure we leave it in the state we found it. All our materials are cut to size by a specialist cutting company before being delivered to your home, so minimal cutting is required onsite, even then we cover and protect the floors, cover your furniture with plastic sheets, use dust extractors connected directly to power tools, we even use a fine dust and chemical extractor for really sensitive areas, this is well over the top but we like to do the very best we can and offer the best service, and when the work is all finished we take all our rubbish away and give your place a clean.

What materials and finishes do you offer?

Our units are built of quality Medite FSC certified MDF wood then painted, or made of wood veneer we can oil or use matt water based clear varnish, and also melamine coated wood as typically found in kitchen units. We are also pioneering research in alternative healthier eco friendlier materials, we are the first UK fitted furniture company to use UK sourced strawboard which is totally natural and bound with no glues at all to make our bespoke furniture, we can build your units out of formaldehyde free MDF too, we also use recycled plastic sheeting for decorative purposes with lighting behind and recycled glass as well as many other sustainable materials and finishes to find out more please see our eco page.

Do you paint the units and what colours do you offer?

Yes, we use the best quality professional waterbased DULUX and Farrow and Ball eggshell semi matt white paint . If you would like the eco option using more natural paints please see our environment page. We mostly use white but can paint any colour you like (If you would like to paint your fitted furniture we can offer you free advice).

Do you spray the units and do high gloss?

We can arrange to spray the doors and outside visible parts and make the internal carcass of a white or other colour melamine coated laminate.

Are your charges transparent?

All charges are stated in advance in the final quote, you know what you will pay from the start, everything is listed in the quote. Only handles are optional and to be supplied by you or us, also parking is extra, so they are priced separately. All of which is clearly stated in your quote.

Does your service represent value?

For the quality of service we offer from beginning to end we offer outstanding value, we take great pride in producing only the best bespoke furniture that you will be proud to own for years to come, we offer a 2 year guarantee on our work, we are endorsed by various independent certification bodies, we take customer service very seriously, we understand that there is more to producing furniture than wood and screws, your total satisfaction is our number one priority, but don’t take our word for us see what our clients say.

How flexible are you once the work has started if something needs changing?

Our craftsmen all speak good English and have a great deal of skill and will do everything they can if you feel that something needs adapting, for example you change your mind about how many shelves you want, or the spacing between them, then if it is possible we will do what we can to please you, either free of charge or at extra cost depending on what it is.

Can you fix stuff in my home?

Yes if you need anything fixing in your home while we are there making your fitted furniture, if we can do it we will help you out. I like to offer a service that I would like to use myself so for such things as hanging pictures, fixing doors that don’t close and generally anything wood related tell us when we come to measure up for your fitted furniture.

Do you use real wood?

We use real wood veneers or plastic laminates that look like wood but not generally solid wood, we work with close associates who use solid wood, just ask us for contacts.

We don’t do bathrooms but if we are already working in your house doing other fitted furniture, we will consider any storage you would like for your bathroom.

I have sockets where I want my fitted furniture how will you deal with this?

If you have an electrical, phone or TV areal socket that is ok as we can cut a hole in the back so you can still access them, we can move electrical sockets around if they haven’t got far to go. Phone sockets we can more if there is enough spare wire.

Do you make kitchens?

No we don’t make kitchens but sometimes can make units that go in your kitchen such as a bookcase.

The sustainability of Strawboard as a material for creating fitted furniture.

Home » Blog » The sustainability of Strawboard as a material for creating fitted furniture.

Tristan Titeux’s Pioneering Journey to find the most sustainable eco-friendly materials to design and build Empatika’s bespoke Fitted Furniture.

My journey started in December 2010 when I decided to research and publish my findings of various materials that are available on the European and World market but specially the UK.

On the journey I am taking to discover materials that would be suitable to make Empatika’s modern Eco fitted furniture, I found a great renewable and waste material that would be perfect to make wardrobes and other fitted furniture such as bookcases, media units for TV’s and HIFI’s, storage cupboards, shoe cupboard and home offices; it is straw, which is a waste product of making wheat as you know or Barley, oats, rice or rye, so if you take this waste product which is often burned (no longer allowed in the uk since 1993)or turned back in the soil when not made into straw bedding for animals you can turn it into a very useful and valuable board materials to allow people like us to create contemporary Eco furniture that doesn’t pollute your home or your health if it is bound under pressure with it’s own natural glues like paper masher, but this is still not very common, you are more likely to find straw board mainly coming from china which has MDI glues which are safer than Formaldehyde because they don’t let out gases (off gas) while in your home.

Strawboard can be used just like mdf as it comes in sheets that are flat then can be cut to make contemporary eco fitted furniture such as the wardrobes that Empatika can make with great care and precision, the texture is not 100% perfectly flat but it has a texture that adds character, I guess that it could be made smoother like MDF in the future if the straw was ground finer.

Panel made with straw bonded with formaldehyde free MDI glue.

In fact many waste plant materials can be turned into boards, Empatika hopes to find more sources of such natural products to keep on making more and more sustainable and healthy furniture, these days we are so surrounded by noxious cocktail of chemicals around the home from things like fire retardants in your sofa, carpets, to the paints on your walls, and all the plastics that you use every day that contribute to bad health that it makes sense to minimize these as much as possible.

Straw is a local material as it is grown locally in most parts of the world, so it is an ideal crop as far as reducing food miles go.

At the moment Straw board is imported mainly from China which is not very sustainable as it uses up alot of energy traveling from so far away, but the idea is that strawboard will become popular and once there is a bigger market demand here then it can be made in the UK. Empatika is at the forefront of promoting such clean and sustainable technologies, to ensure that our children and their children have a clean planet to live in that is diverse and full of life.

We have plenty of straw available here in the UK, total straw production is 10 Million tonnes per year of that around 40% is unused or returned to the soil, so I think that this could be great to use to make some of this to make boards to use as well as wood boards to give a good variety of material available. It is a good idea to use as many different sources as possible to make things so that not one can take over and cause problems if there is either a lack of that crop or a problem with it, disease or environmental issue. I am very against using crops such as straw to burn in power plants to produce energy, that is not very efficient, I think burning should be a last resort, first use it for animal bedding, put some in the ground if needed for fertilising, and use the rest for all different uses including strawboards and also strawbales for making houses of course! There are many uses. But burning it first off is a no no for me. Once it has come to the end of it’s useful life, has been turned into boards for example, then it can no longer be reused or recycled then consider burning it, if it is made lf natural materials.

I think all things should follow that priority cycle or reduce, use, reuse, recycle, compost, burn. Another thing that needs addressing is the fact that straw is made using chemical fertilisers and pesticides which go and pollute the environment and decrease bio diversity, for straw to be totally sustainable it needs to be grown Organically.

Different panels available.

Enviroboard is really sustainable as it uses many different straws mixed together such as rice, barley, wheat straw, elephant grass or recycled paper which is manufacutered in the US.

Environ biocomposites makes Biofiber which is made of straw and Dakota Burl which is made of sunfllower hulls.

Kirei strawboard made from sorghum http://youtu.be/JfjDyPjW6bQ

We have used a similar materials found and produced in the UK by Stramit in a pioneering project by Empatika making strawboard floating shelves, this is the first time that anyone has used this material to make fitted furniture as it is usually used for insulation in buildings designed by Stramit. Below is a picture of the project where you can see the straw exposed at the front of the shelf. The straw board is bonded together under extremely high pressure and that is what keeps it together without glue apart from a cardboard outer coating to keep it together.

Pioneering project designed by Tristan Titeux, Creative director of Empatika in London Natures Paper in Australia currently make a paper made from straw.

Another video on strawboard, though I am not sure about the claims that it uses natural glue to bond it and that it is biodegrable, it uses MDI glue and I am not aware that MDI glue is biodegradable, and it is certainly not natural it is a by product of the oil industry (I think it is important to be truthful and not over play and invent things to make them sound better than they are): http://youtu.be/8Jd0920Cxh8 In 2011 Envirowall has started selling strawboard and other amazing eco board products in the UK http://youtu.be/2h3tcbhB4j4

How Strawboard is made: http://youtu.be/-aH3rgdYqiw Here is a company in Canada making strawboard: http://youtu.be/lZTwP8KkLUs

History.

Construction panels built from agricultural wastes have been around for hundreds of years, especially in Central and Eastern Europe where pressed leaves and straw were used as insulation and even structural material.

Strawboard isn’t a new invention. In 1887, Monroe Seiberling of Akron, Ohio, traveled to Kokomo to open the Kokomo Strawboard Company, which would make shoeboxes out of straw and employ seventy-five people.

In 1836: Andrew Tait built a paper and strawboard mill in Trumbull US. You would think that plastic that is made with petrol could never be made with plant material, but cars are also being made out of straw, this also is not new. Bio-composite materials have been around at least since the 1920s, when Henry Ford built prototype car components, including dashboards, door panels and passenger compartment parts, out of hemp-derived plastics.

But as the car-making industry works to become more sustainable, veggie-based bio-composites are taking on newfound importance across the industry. After all, compared to traditional materials, they’re light, strong, durable and competitively priced.

The parts are not made from raw vegetables; instead, their fibers and chemicals are broken down at microscopic levels and reformed into usable compounds.

Scientists say bio-composites are kilo-for-kilo stronger than steel, and are lighter and cheaper to produce than traditional petroleum-based plastics.

We are so used to petrol making everything from fuel, to plastic cups and the clothing we wear that we would be led to believe that plant based materials are an old technologies of the past, but it is very much of the future, let us learn more from our past and we will better understand our future.

How Strawboard is made:

If you want to make strawboard you can buy the machines from Compak systems

Isobord Plant.

Isobord in Canada, Manitoba started making strawboard in the 90’s with a cooperative of 350 farmers in a $140 Million, 215 thousand square foot plant, capable of processing 200 thousand tonnes of wheat straw per year (in the UK we currently have over 2 million tonnes of waste straw available), designed to produce 130 million square feet of strawboard (two per cent of the entire North American particleboard market).

More of Isobord and tons of in depth information about the strawboard making process here: http://www.forestnet.com/archives/Dec_Jan_99/mill_profile.html

Another interesting and detailed account of the Isobord strawboard making process: http://www.woodworkingnetwork.com/articles/isobord_enterprises_inc_-_wheat_fields_of_dreams_127688668.html

More about Straw and it’s qualities: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m3156/is_n1_v103/ai_n25024836/ Strawboard in the US: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m3156/is_n1_v103/ai_n25024842/ About Straw on Wikipedia

Please Connect with me here:

Facebook Personal Page: https://www.facebook.com/empatika

Facebook Like Page: https://www.facebook.com/empatika

You Tube Channel: Search for “empatika” or click here: http://tiny.cc/76moe

Twitter, search for “@TristanTiteux” here: https://twitter.com/

LinkedIn, search for “Tristan Titeux”

I would like to thank the amazing photographer Stefan Lubo for letting me use the Featured image of the straw bales, you can commission Stefan to document your life in a special way, check out his website StefanLubo.com

The sustainability of Strawboard as a material for creating fitted furniture.

Different panels available.

History.

How Strawboard is made:

Why Bespoke Furniture Is Getting More Popular

Top Tips for Reducing Background Noise at Home

Autumnal Interiors: How To Refresh Your Home on a Budget