Our story
From a Sussex packaging stream to a specified panel.
Where we started
A workshop, an off-cut pile, and a better idea.
Sustainable Ply began long before the first panel was made. While studying design at university, founder Paris May was drawn to the creative potential of cardboard as a lightweight, versatile material. Later, working as a prop maker and fabricator for exhibitions, television and film productions, he witnessed the enormous volume of materials discarded after a project ended. Timber, sheet materials and set components were routinely returned to workshops only to be thrown away. Alongside this was another constant waste stream: high quality corrugated cardboard arriving every day as packaging and leaving as waste.
In 2025, working from a Sussex workshop, Paris began experimenting with ways to transform recovered cardboard into a lightweight structural panel. The goal was simple: create a practical material from an overlooked resource. The resulting boards proved strong, lightweight, easy to machine and suitable for display, interiors, packaging and creative applications. What started as a response to waste became Sustainable Ply.
Today the workshop runs from Unit B 27 at Bridge Farm, three miles south of Lewes town centre and twelve from Brighton. Five local partners feed the recovery stream weekly: coffee roasters, gelato makers, NHS sterile-packaging operations, construction sites and facilities-management companies all divert their corrugated material to us instead of to general recycling. Every panel that leaves the workshop carries a batch ID and a written take-back commitment. The loop is the product.
By the workshop
A small operation, on purpose.
Founded 2025
Lewes-based since day one
Unit B 27, Bridge Farm, East Sussex
100% UK manufacture
Cut, laminated, edge-finished in-house
The team
The hands on the material.
A small team of makers, specifiers and circular-material specialists running the workshop and supporting projects from first sample to final dispatch. Phone calls answered by the people who’ll cut your panel.
Paris May
Designer, maker and material innovator with over a decade of experience in exhibitions, interiors and fabrication. Sustainable Ply grew from Paris’s interest in circular design and a desire to find higher value uses for materials often treated as waste.
Sorrel Bradley
Shapes the visual identity of Sustainable Ply across our website, presentations and marketing materials. Works closely on product launches, photography and storytelling, helping communicate the value of circular materials in a clear and engaging way.
Why we built it
We built Sustainable Ply because the best panel material was already in the room, arriving as packaging, leaving as recovered fibre. We just rebuilt the loop.
Where we work
Bridge Farm, Lewes.
Unit B 27, Bridge Farm
Barcombe Mills Road
Lewes, BN8 5BX
Monday–Friday, 9.00 am to 5.00 pm
Site visits by appointment
Next step
Visit the workshop. Or just hold the material.
Every first project gets a free sample: a real off-cut so you can weigh it, see it before you specify. Or get in touch and we’ll talk through your project.