Sustainable Product Design students win funds to make locally sourced, eco-friendly chalk
17 April 2026
Two second year BA(Hons) Sustainable Product Design students have recently been awarded £3,000 as part of Falmouth’s annual Dragons’ Den competition. Run by the Employability team, the event gives students the chance to develop their business ideas in a setting that reflects real industry expectations while also giving the students the opportunity to receive funds and further their projects.
For Charlotte May and Arwen Weston, their winning project is an idea that has been in development across the last few months, after the pair realised chalk on the market today is largely quarried and imported. Wanting to create a sustainable alternative to drawing chalk, they came up with Kreyon, inspired by the Cornish word ‘krey’ for chalk. The product is an eco-friendly chalk stick comprised of oyster shells, a waste stream from local Cornish restaurants.
Speaking about their project, Charlotte shared: “We were initially working on developing a wooden modular handle for ordinary chalk as part of a project, but then decided to research other material possibilities for the chalk itself and fell upon oyster shells, as they are so abundant in Falmouth.
“Pacific oyster shells in particular are a non-native, invasive species taking over estuaries and inlets spanning from South Cornwall’s coast through to Devon. A couple of the restaurants we’ve been collecting from switch to them in the summer and we may have the chance to cull them ourselves along Falmouth’s estuary and work alongside marine conservationists. We should have an abundant supply of them in the summer.”
Oyster shells are 95% calcium carbonate; a core ingredient needed for making crayon. By using oyster shells as the main component of the product, the students have been able to create an item that is zero-waste in its production. Charlotte said: “We simply collect the shells from local restaurants such as Indidog, Beach House and Harbour House and take them to the workshops on Falmouth Campus to wash them, fire them in an oven and grind them down. We then mix this with a small amount of another mineral and water and feed it into our moulds.”
Now, the students are looking forward to taking their product to the next stage. With £3,000 in prize money after coming out top at this year’s Dragons’ Den competition, they are looking to use their funds to outsource packaging, buy equipment, set up a website and scale up batch production to distribute to shops.
Speaking on the win, Charlotte said: “We’re both so excited to have received both the top prize and lots of useful feedback from the judges. Our mentor, Marcus Simmons, also advised us greatly with the application process.”
Reflecting on the course itself, Charlotte has shared how it’s not only taught them an abundance of skills that are applicable to the industry – sketching, computer-aided design, prototyping and collaboration – but allowed them to engage with businesses through live briefs, helping to solve real problems. “It’s been an invaluable experience,” Charlotte shared. “Through the course, we’ve gauged the heightened responsibility we have as designers and how designing something truly sustainable entails a holistic outlook that considers materiality, lifecycle, design to repair and manufacturing processes.
“Any doubts or questions we’ve had along the way, with this project and others, are always met with honest and constructive feedback by our tutors and the technicians in the workshops, which has helped us to critically analyse and self-reflect on our design processes. We both feel very grateful to have received so much support and are excited to see how Kreyon evolves for the foreseeable.”
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