Costa Rican mother saves for 9 years to buy land, then built a home with 7 tonnes of recycled plastic. Here's how she did it

After saving for nine years to buy a small plot of land, Cindy Mora Abarca finally got a permanent home for herself and her 6-year-old son, Fabrizio, but the house came with an unusual twist. Their home in Lámparas, Alajuelita, near San José, Costa Rica, was built using interlocking blocks made largely from recycled plastic.

Mora had managed to purchase the land with a loan but did not have enough money left to build a house. Her situation changed after Habitat for Humanity Costa Rica connected her case with Procter & Gamble, local organisation Urbarium and recycled materials group Ekojunto.

The construction started in April 2018, and the completed house was handed over to Mora and her son on May 26. The project used several tonnes of discarded plastic, turning material that could otherwise have gone to landfills or waterways into part of a family's home.

How recycled plastic became the home's walls

According to La Nación, about 7 tons of recycled plastic went into the construction of the house. The material came through Procter & Gamble's corporate social responsibility programme.

The plastic was converted into interlocking blocks called Bloqueplas. The blocks were designed to fit together in a way similar to Lego pieces, allowing them to be used for the home's walls.

Andrea Ramírez of Urbarium described the system as a way of turning plastic waste into a construction resource instead of treating it only as material for disposal.

Some later versions of the story have mentioned around 850 blocks being used. However, the original Costa Rican report focused mainly on the approximately 7 tons of recycled plastic used for the project.

The recycled blocks were not used for every part of the house. Traditional construction methods were used for elements including the foundation, roof, plumbing, electrical wiring, doors and windows.

After plastering and painting, the finished building looked like a conventional modest home rather than a structure made from recycled material.

Why the '800 volunteers' claim is misleading

The project has also been repeatedly described online as a house built by 800 volunteers. But the original report refers to more than 800 combined hours of volunteer work, mainly involving Procter & Gamble employees.

That is different from saying 800 people worked on the house.

Habitat for Humanity Costa Rica helped select Mora's family based on socioeconomic need and checked that the property met the requirements for construction. Urbarium handled the local implementation of the recycled plastic block system.

Volunteers then worked on the construction alongside the organisations involved in the project.

The house was therefore the result of a partnership involving a housing organisation, a private company, local specialists and volunteers, rather than hundreds of individual people building the structure.

What the plastic-block home was meant to show

The project aimed to demonstrate that plastic waste could be redirected into construction while also addressing the need for affordable housing.

Urbarium attributed several features to its block system, including resistance to seismic forces as well as thermal and acoustic insulation. The organisation also said the blocks were designed to comply with Costa Rica's 2010 seismic construction code.