From Plastic Bottle to Panel: How Feltbay Makes Recycled PET Felt

From Plastic Bottle to Panel: How FELTBAY Makes Recycled PET Felt

Sustainability in manufacturing isn't just about using recycled materials — it's about the entire process from raw input to finished product. At FELTBAY, that journey begins with post-consumer PET plastic and ends with a certified, high-performance acoustic panel.

Raw Material: Pre-Coloured Recycled PET Fibre

Every FELTBAY panel starts as post-consumer PET — predominantly plastic bottles — that has been cleaned, shredded, and processed into fine polyester fibres. These fibres arrive at our facility already in the correct colour, with pigment embedded during fibre production. This means the colour runs through the full depth of every fibre, making the finished panel inherently resistant to fading, scratching, and surface wear. Using recycled PET rather than virgin polyester significantly reduces the embodied carbon of each panel while diverting waste from landfill and ocean.

Panel Formation: Needle-Punching

The pre-coloured fibres are layered to the required density and bonded through a needle-punching process — mechanically interlocking the fibres without adhesives or chemical binders. This is why PET felt panels are low-VOC and safe for occupied spaces. The density and thickness of the panel determines its acoustic performance. FELTBAY offers panels in 5mm, 9mm, 12mm, and 24mm thicknesses, each engineered for different acoustic and structural requirements.

Precision Cutting and Quality Control

Formed panels are cut to size using CNC machinery, enabling precise custom shapes, patterns, and perforations. Every batch is quality-checked for dimensional accuracy, colour consistency, and surface finish before dispatch. Our current range includes over 40 standard colours across five curated collections — Coastal, Stone, Desert, Forest, and Vibrant — with custom colour matching available for larger projects.

Made in the UAE

FELTBAY's manufacturing facility is based in Abu Dhabi, UAE — a strategic location at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. The UAE's world-class logistics infrastructure gives us a direct supply chain advantage: shorter delivery windows and lower transport emissions for the MENA region, and efficient export routes for projects in Europe, Scandinavia, and North America.

Every panel we make is a step toward a cleaner built environment — one recycled bottle at a time.