Turn plastic waste into new things. MakeHaven's Precious Plastic workshop is part of the global Precious Plastic network: shred discarded plastic, then melt and mold it into tiles, bowls, parts and products. Members can use it any time once they have the badges.
New to MakeHaven?
Come see the plastics workshop on a tour. Membership includes training on every machine below.
Already a member?
Start with the shredder badge, then add the oven or the injection molder. Follow the program to hear about plastics sessions.
How it works
- CollectSave your own clean plastic: bottle caps, containers and packaging. We cannot take drop-offs.
- SortSeparate it by type, the number in the recycling triangle. Types do not mix when melted.
- ShredThe shredder turns each type into flakes ready to melt.
- Melt and moldPress flakes into a mold with the injection molder, or melt them into sheets in the oven.
- FinishTrim, sand and drill the result in our shops, like any other material.
The machines
Shredder
Grinds clean, sorted plastic into flakes, the raw material for everything else.
Injection molders
Melt flakes and press them into a mold, for repeatable parts like handles, buttons and small products. We have a vertical molder and a small one.
Compression oven
Melts flakes in a mold, for tiles, sheets, bowls and larger pieces.
Next to the plastics machines, the casting and plastics area has a vacuum former, a pressure pot and vacuum chamber for resin casting, and a resin 3D printer.
A global movement
Precious Plastic started in the Netherlands in 2013 as an open-source project. It publishes free blueprints for the machines, and a worldwide community of workshops builds them, shares molds and product designs, and turns local plastic waste into things worth keeping. Products like these (photo: Precious Plastic) are made on the same kinds of machines we have.
At MakeHaven
Members started melting plastic in the compression oven in 2021, and the shredder followed in 2022. More than 60 members have earned each of those badges. With the vertical injection molder in place, we inaugurated the full Precious Plastic workshop in April 2026.
We do not have space to collect plastic, so bring your own, cleaned and sorted, for your projects. The badge sessions cover which plastics are safe to melt and how to run each machine.
Questions about the plastics workshop? Email info@makehaven.org.
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