The Stretch Bed
Recycled plastic, galvanised steel, heavy-duty canvas. 26kg, flat-packs, no tools. Every bed supports remote First Nations communities across Australia.
The Stretch Bed
Three materials. No tools. Five minutes.
26kg, supports 200kg, designed to last 10+ years. Each bed diverts 20kg of plastic from landfill.
Recycled Plastic Frame
HDPE legs from community plastic. 20kg diverted per bed.
Galvanised Steel Poles
Two 26.9mm poles thread through canvas sleeves.
Heavy-Duty Canvas
Washable, repairable, built for remote conditions.
Support System
Every bed tracked. Ask questions, stay connected, get support.
Thread poles through the X-legs
Toward manufacturing on Country
Beds assembled by the people who’ll sleep on them.
Toward On-Country Manufacturing
From rubbish to bed
A containerised production plant that turns community plastic waste into bed components. Local people do the making.
Collect
Local people gather plastic waste from around community. Sorted by colour, cleaned, ready for shredding.
Shred
Plastic goes into the shredder: a containerised unit that stays on site between production runs.
Press
Shredded plastic is heated and pressed into durable sheets. Each colour is unique, made from whatever plastic the community collected.
Cut
A CNC router cuts bed leg components from the pressed sheets. Precise, repeatable, minimal waste.
Assemble
Thread a pole through each canvas sleeve and the X-leg holes, then tension. Done in under 5 minutes, no tools.
~30 beds per week · 20kg plastic diverted per bed
Goods on CountryDesigned in community
Two years around the fire with the Bloomfield family.
Oonchiumpa Consultancy is a 100% Aboriginal-owned business in Alice Springs. The Stretch Bed and Pakkimjalki Kari washing machine were both designed there, in community, with Elders and young people pulling apart prototypes and putting them back together.
What started as a design partnership is becoming an enterprise: a production facility in Alice Springs, young people building beds, and a pipeline from local knowledge to local jobs.
“We want to create a safe space for our young people. There’s a lack of housing, which leads to a lack of sleep, which leads to low school attendance.”See the Oonchiumpa partnership →
Our Impact
Beds and washing machines in homes across remote Australia.
Field notes
From Alice Springs to Utopia
Alice Springs · Utopia Homelands · Arawerr · Ampilatwatja, NT · 20–22 May 2026
Three days across Alice Springs, Utopia, Arawerr and Ampilatwatja. Young people built beds in Alice with Oonchiumpa. Local teams led the deliveries out to the homelands. We sat with Elders. 87 beds, materials from Centrecorp Foundation.
A good bed is health hardware, not furniture.
Community-designed. Assembled on Country. Built to last more than ten years in remote Australia.