This keynote, inspired by Tyra Oseng-Rees’s TEDx talk from June 2025, invites audiences to reconsider their relationship with waste, not as a problem, but as a possibility. What if discarded materials are simply raw resources waiting to be transformed into something beautiful, functional, and deeply valuable?

Tyra takes the audience on a journey that challenges perceptions, exploring how fused recycled glass is more than just a material, it’s a mindset shift. Through creativity, circular thinking, and courageous entrepreneurship, she demonstrates that rethinking resources means rethinking the future itself.

Along the way, she reveals a powerful framework, “the Five Ways of Working”, which has shaped her systems thinking and can drive systemic change across industries. This isn’t just about sustainability. It’s about transforming how we think, how we design, and how we create solutions for future generations.

Tyra shares the compelling story behind her entrepreneurial journey: a university collaboration rooted in a groundbreaking law that led to the founding of Oseng-Rees Reflection Ltd. Working with students, researchers, architects, and university leadership, she helped turn 100% recycled glass into a real-world architectural installation, an embodiment of systemic thinking and tangible action.

More than a technical achievement, this presentation offers a mindset shift. Through the lens of fused recycled glass, Tyra explores how creativity, courageous entrepreneurship, and strategic collaboration can ignite systemic change across industries. It’s a call to action, to rethink how we live, design, and create for the generations ahead.

Tyra Oseng-Rees will share the story behind Oseng-Rees Reflection Ltd and its pioneering work transforming discarded glass into sustainable architectural materials. She will outline the business's material development journey, highlighting the credentials and environmental integrity of a unique glass composite created entirely from waste. Developed within a research and development context, this material is now being explored for innovative architectural applications.

In her talk, Tyra will also reveal the collaborative process behind the award-winning Buttermarket glass wall installation, a striking example of artistic, technical, and strategic partnership. Developed in close collaboration with the architect at Threads, this project exemplifies how circular design, and interdisciplinary teamwork can lead to public-facing structures that are both beautiful and ecologically responsible.

In this keynote, Tyra Oseng-Rees will present the pioneering research and development that led to the creation of a sustainable fused recycled glass material, an innovation born from a practice-based PhD that bridged the disciplines of art, science, and engineering. By integrating both qualitative and quantitative testing methodologies, Tyra explored the full aesthetic and structural potential of post-consumer glass waste, transforming it into a high-integrity material for architectural applications.

Following the establishment of Oseng-Rees Reflection Ltd, Tyra has continued this interdisciplinary approach through collaborations with multiple universities, ensuring rigorous testing and ongoing refinement of the material's performance. Her latest academic milestone, a peer-reviewed publication in Glass Structural Engineering by Springer, details the environmental and impact testing of these recycled glass tiles, establishing their credentials for real-world use in buildings and installations.

Through this talk, Tyra will share how artistic inquiry, scientific precision, and circular economy principles can converge to produce beautiful, resilient, and environmentally responsible architectural materials.

Tyra Oseng-Rees will share a series of compelling case studies that demonstrate how fused recycled glass, crafted entirely from post-consumer waste, has been successfully applied in both architectural and interior contexts. She will also highlight her pioneering work repurposing waste car glass for award trophy development. These installations showcase the material’s versatility, aesthetic potential, and structural integrity, along with its alignment with circular economy principles.

From dynamic façades that interact with light and urban texture, to bespoke interior surfaces and commercial products that invite tactile engagement and storytelling, Tyra’s work exemplifies how sustainable design can elevate public awareness of waste utilisation and upcycling. Each project reflects a collaborative, systems-thinking approach, often involving architects, engineers, and community partners, and demonstrates her commitment to visibility, proper attribution, and long-term material performance.

Through these examples, Tyra will explore not only the technical and artistic successes, but also the advocacy and policy implications, revealing how a discarded material can become a catalyst for innovation, beauty, and systemic change.

In this forward-looking keynote, Tyra Oseng-Rees explores the horizon of sustainable design through the lens of recycled glass innovation. Drawing from her practice-based research and years of interdisciplinary collaboration, she will discuss emerging approaches to strengthen policy frameworks, expand scientific inquiry, and foster cross-sector partnerships that champion material integrity and environmental justice.

Building on the successes of Oseng-Rees Reflection Ltd and recent academic contributions, Tyra will highlight how strategic alliances, with universities, architects, engineers, and policymakers, can catalyse new standards for circular design and post-consumer material use. This session will spotlight future directions for testing, certification, and recognition of fused recycled glass as a credible material in the built environment.

Through narrative, research, and advocacy, Tyra will propose a collaborative roadmap for embedding recycled glass innovation into public policy, architectural practice, and educational systems, ensuring that sustainability is not just a concept, but a lived, visible reality.

In this inspiring keynote, Tyra Oseng-Rees reflects on her personal journey and the powerful lessons she’s learned as a woman entrepreneur and creative leader. Sparked by a poignant question posed by group of secondary school students “If you could change one thing to make the world better for women, what would it be?”.  Tyra explores how qualities often dismissed as “soft skills” are, in fact, the backbone of strong leadership. Empathy, emotional intelligence, adaptability, collaboration, and resilience are core traits women bring to entrepreneurial spaces, yet they remain undervalued in conventional leadership paradigms.

Through stories of overcoming chronic low self-esteem, early discouragement, and self-doubt, Tyra shares how she built what she calls a “Mental Toolkit of Resilience”, a collection of small victories and personal growth moments that have fuelled her journey from creative aspiration to award-winning business founder. Her experience illustrates how setbacks can shape, rather than derail, a person’s path when met with courage and introspection.

As the founder of Oseng-Rees Reflection Ltd, Tyra now blends sustainability, design, and advocacy to empower emerging entrepreneurs and amplify underrepresented voices. This keynote is both a reflection and a call to action: to recognise and celebrate women’s contributions not as an exception, but as essential to creating workplaces, communities, and economies rooted in empathy, innovation, and well-being.