Recycled-Materials Facts

Justo Gallego Martinez spent 60 years building a full-scale cathedral by himself in Mejorada del Campo, Spain. He had no architectural training, no blueprints, and no building permits. He used recycled junk - stacked oil drums for pillars, bicycle wheels as molds, broken glass for windows - on land he inherited. He died in November 2021, aged 96, with the cathedral still unfinished.

Nek Chand was an Indian roads inspector who began secretly building a garden in a forbidden forest gorge around 1965. He hid thousands of sculptures there for about a decade, made from broken bangles, tiles and factory waste. Officials discovered it in 1975 and could have torn it down. Instead they gave him a salary and 50 workers. The Rock Garden now covers 40 acres with over 5,000 statues.