Circular Düsseldorf Apartment Hits Minus 577 kg CO₂e

A Düsseldorf apartment renovation by local practice Urselmann Interior achieves a net-negative carbon balance of minus 577 kg CO₂e, verified under the circular assessment standard DIN SPEC 91606. The project, set within a 1939 residential building, is engineered entirely for circular disassembly — and its supply chain is contractually bound to take the materials back.

The studio signed take-back agreements with nine manufacturers: Pfleiderer, Granorte, Shards, Søuld, ClayTec, STRAMEN.TEC, Tarkett, Bosch, and Vitra. The contracts ensure that interior building products can be reclaimed and reprocessed into new materials at the end of their lifecycle. For practitioners, the model matters because it shifts end-of-life responsibility from the demolition contractor to the producer.

Every joint in the interior is reversible. All joinery relies on mechanical dry joints, screws, and reversible adhesives, so that components can be sorted by material category rather than landfilled as mixed waste. Major kitchen appliances are leased rather than purchased, removing them from the ownership equation entirely.

Which materials carry the carbon math?

The palette prioritizes biogenic, carbon-sequestering matter: straw, cork, wood, and seagrass. Clay plaster mixed with golden straw makes the walls shimmer as the sun moves across them, according to the project description. The ceiling carries acoustic panels made from seagrass, set between timber battens. These choices, not offsetting, produce the minus 577 kg CO₂e figure.

Salvage runs through the fit-out at every scale:

• The living room coffee table combines marble salvaged from a demolished bank with wood offcuts.
• Kitchen cabinets use glass taken from the apartment's own original doors.
• Wall tiles in the dining area are pressed from construction rubble, laid over a cork floor.
• The heavy perimeter curtain hung in a fashion showroom before installation; its fabric also reupholstered the sofa, repaired with Ida West.
• The original bath and tiles were repaired rather than replaced, with clay plaster brought flush to the tiles.

How does the plan work without partitions?

To optimize the compact footprint, Urselmann Interior removed two internal walls and a door, merging the entryway, kitchen, dining, and living zones into one continuous open-plan volume. Operable textiles and multi-tiered interventions subdivide the program without rigid permanent partitions.

In the living area, a heavy curved curtain deploys around a sleeper sofa to form a private guest room. The bedroom sits on a three-tier timber platform that puts the bed on top and a pull-out wardrobe underneath, integrating a desk and a meditation space; a full-height curtain hides the bed completely by day, so the room works as a study. The stepped platforms effectively double the functional usable space of the apartment.

The color strategy draws on the architecture of Luis Barragán. A vibrant Mexican Pink entrance corridor transitions into green-blue living quarters detailed with glossy turquoise tiles and integrated houseplant arrangements.

Photography is by Magdalena Gruber. As DIN SPEC 91606 assessments become more common in European procurement, the Düsseldorf apartment offers a worked precedent: a domestic interior whose materials have a contractual route back to their manufacturers — and a verified carbon deficit to show for it.