The street furniture industry is at a crossroads. On one side lies the familiar path of disposable design and short-term thinking; on the other, a more considered approach that recognises our responsibility to future generations. After decades in this field, I've become increasingly convinced that sustainability isn't an add-on to urban furniture specification. It's fundamental to everything we do.
The reality is this: outdoor furniture gets replaced far too often – sometimes that's because trends didn’t stand the test of time, or because the product simply wasn’t built to last. Furnitubes has seen this cycle repeat itself across countless projects. When poor-quality products are specified, short lifecycles and frequent replacement become inevitable. Unfortunately, this is waste dressed up as renewal.
The true cost of short-term thinking
When landscape architects specify urban furniture, they're making decisions that ripple decades into the future. A bench installed today might still be serving communities in 2050 and beyond — or it might be languishing in a landfill within five years. The difference comes down to how we think about longevity from the outset.
Furnitubes has always maintained that building products to outlast us is simply good stewardship. Every piece of street furniture represents embodied carbon, material extraction, manufacturing energy, and transport emissions. When something needs replacing after a decade rather than lasting for generations, the environmental impact multiplies exponentially alongside the financial cost.
This understanding shapes every material decision Furnitubes makes. Take timber, for instance. For years it’s worked with FSC-certified Iroko: a beautiful, durable hardwood that performs brilliantly in British weather. Yet despite its technical excellence, Furnitubes has been deliberately phasing down its Iroko specifications. Sustainability demands the company look beyond immediate performance to consider sourcing challenges, habitat pressures, and the broader ecological picture.
Materials that tell better stories
The search for alternatives led Furnitubes to reclaimed hardwoods salvaged from dock timbers, railway sleepers, and industrial structures. These materials carry their own histories. With decades of service already behind them, they offer a second life that cuts emissions whilst reducing demand for virgin timber. Each piece bears the marks of its previous purpose, creating urban furniture with genuine character rather than manufactured patina.More recently, Furnitubes introduced Endura™ Thermally Modified Ash: British ash transformed through sustainable thermal modification rather than chemical treatment. The process enhances durability dramatically whilst avoiding the preservatives that complicate end-of-life recycling. Perhaps most significantly, it reduces the company’s reliance on tropical hardwoods, bringing material sourcing closer to home.
These represent a fundamental shift in how Furnitubes thinks about timber in urban contexts: considering where wood comes from, where it's been, and where it might go after its service life ends.
The circular mindset in practice
Genuine sustainability thinking embraces the entire lifecycle. How much energy did material production consume? What emissions resulted from transportation? How maintainable will this product be in five, ten, twenty years? Can components be separated for recycling? What happens at end-of-life?
These questions often reveal surprising answers. A product made from sustainable materials might still generate enormous carbon emissions if it's manufactured overseas and shipped thousands of miles. British manufacturing offers inherently shorter supply chains, lower transport emissions, and support for local economies. Geography matters.
Design decisions matter too. When Furnitubes engineers products for disassembly, it’s planning decades ahead for materials recovery. When it standardises components across product ranges, it’s ensuring that parts remain available for maintenance long after initial installation. When it chooses its carefully developed triple process powder coating over galvanising and powder coating (through intentional partnerships and innovations such as that delivered by Custom Wytelyne), it’s eliminating volatile organic compounds whilst improving durability. These choices accumulate into genuinely sustainable outcomes.
Beyond environmental sustainability
Sustainability extends beyond the ecological. The social dimension matters just as much… perhaps more. A bench needs to invite people to sit. Urban furniture needs to welcome wheelchair users and remain comfortable for longer than five minutes.
This understanding drives the Furnitubes design process. The company obsesses over lumbar support, seat depth, and armrest placement. It ensures surfaces don't become unbearably hot in summer sun or freezing in winter cold. It considers sight lines and personal space, creating opportunities for social connection without forcing unwanted proximity. It designs for the full spectrum of human diversity: different ages, abilities, body types, and cultural preferences.
When outdoor spaces feel welcoming to everyone, they get used more. When they get used more, they're valued more. When they're valued more, they're maintained better and last longer. Social sustainability creates environmental sustainability through simple human psychology.
The specification challenge
I recognise the pressures facing landscape architects and estate managers. Budgets tighten whilst expectations rise. Timescales compress. The temptation to choose based purely on initial cost becomes overwhelming. Yet initial cost tells only a fraction of the story.
Consider two hypothetical benches. Bench A costs £800 and lasts eight years before requiring replacement. Bench B costs £1,200 and lasts thirty years with minimal maintenance. Over three decades, Bench A costs £3,200 plus inflation and generates three times the embodied carbon. Bench B costs £1,200 once. The option with an initially higher outlay proves far more economical and far more sustainable.
This holds true in practice. Furnitubes has seen its products endure decades of intensive use in demanding environments, from coastal promenades to busy transport hubs. They weather, certainly, but they remain fundamentally sound, still serving their communities long after cheaper alternatives have been replaced many times over.
The contractor's perspective
For contractors and facilities managers, sustainability manifests differently. It appears in maintenance schedules that don't spiral out of control, in products that clean easily without specialist treatments, in standardised fixings that simplify repairs, and in manufacturers that remain contactable decades later when components need replacing.
It appears in vandalism resistance, too. Products built with genuine substance withstand misuse that would destroy flimsier alternatives. They weather storms that would topple lightweight installations. They endure the relentless exposure that British weather inflicts. This resilience is designed in from the start, recognising that true sustainability means surviving reality in all its messy unpredictability.
Looking forward
The conversation around sustainable urban furniture continues evolving. Material innovations emerge. Manufacturing processes improve. Our understanding of environmental impact deepens. Yet certain principles remain constant: build things properly, build them to last, consider their full lifecycle, and never forget the humans who'll use them.
Furnitubes is not perfect. Sustainability remains a journey rather than a destination, with each project teaching new lessons. Some specifications work brilliantly; others reveal unexpected challenges. The key is maintaining curiosity, staying open to better approaches, and never settling for "good enough" when genuine improvement remains possible. Urban furniture might seem mundane compared to landmark architecture, yet its cumulative impact is enormous. Every bench, every bin, every planter installed across British towns and cities represents either thoughtful stewardship or missed opportunity. Multiply those choices across thousands of projects annually, and the collective effect on both environment and community wellbeing becomes staggering.
The question facing our industry has evolved. We know sustainability matters. What we're grappling with now is whether we're brave enough to make it genuinely central to everything we do, even when that proves inconvenient or challenging. After decades in this field, I've become increasingly convinced that sustainability isn't an add-on to urban furniture specification. The alternative is to continue as if resources were infinite and consequences were someone else's problem, and that simply isn't viable.
Our obligation extends beyond meeting current regulations or ticking procurement boxes. It means leaving urban environments that enrich the communities they serve. It means creating furniture that our grandchildren might still use, still appreciate, still benefit from. It means recognising that every decision made today ripples forward through decades. Good stewardship asks this of us. Our communities deserve nothing less.
Author Catherine Barratt is Managing Director of Furnitubes, a British manufacturer of urban furniture committed to sustainable design and long-term thinking. Learn more about its approach to sustainable materials and explore its product range.
