Colours of mother nature

We had a little visitor today, he found a home in amongst our recycled business cards! So beautiful, his shell a vibrant green, and a head of red.

♥ mother nature’s colour selection.

Necktie Owl

Erica made a necktie owl using a thrifted mens necktie, and a tutorial by Harrysdesk

Ally’s PDF step-by step tutorial is available to buy through Recycled Market at just $4> here

If you prefer a DIY kit with all the necessary materials included, they are sold for $8> here.

Children as young as five can master this quick adorable owl brooch.  Great gift for a craft-loving child, or adult?

Recycled Market - In the Press

Recycled Craft for Kids

Reclaimed Airplane Hotel

Recycling with a difference, Hotel Costa Verde in Costa Rica offers stays in a vintage 1965 Boeing 727 airframe which in its prior life shuttled globetrotters on South Africa Air and Avianca Airlines (Colombia).

Introducing Lumoi - Featured Seller

It is with pleasure to introduce Lumoi  to Recycled Market.

Lumoi is an on-line ethical jewellery boutique offering handmade pieces designed and made by Louise Hall.

Louise has worked in the jewellery industry for 9 years. She started her career as a buyers assistant on the jewellery desk for a TV shopping channel. This fueled her passion for jewellery and allowed her to work with a wide range of designs from the UK and abroad, visiting many of the UK based jewellery shows and the Vincenza Jewellery show in Italy.

Lou went on to London’s jewellery quarter, Hatton Garden where she then worked for a major Diamond and Gold importers. Intrigued by the intricate processes involved, specifically in handmade jewellery production, Louise decided to dedicate her spare time to exploring jewellery making techniques and design herself.

In Jan 2008 Lumoi was born.

All Lumoi jewellery is made by hand from Louise’s London based studio. We never produce more than 5 pieces of each design, with most of our lines being one of a kind. We do this to avoid contributing to an already flooded market whilst keeping you safe with the knowledge that they will stand out from the crowd with something truly different.

One of Louise’s favorite mediums to work with is Precious Metal Clay (PMC) which is a wonderful material that is relatively new to the jewellery industry. One of the best things about PMC for us (and you) is it’s low impact on the environment. The ground fine silver particles are recycled & reclaimed from scraps, x-ray and film plates. So it has great Eco-credentials! PMC is finely ground pure silver particles mixed together with an organic binder to form a clay like material. The ‘clay’ can be shaped and molded by hand and interesting textures and shapes can be made with the use of hand tools. Once dried PMC can be fired in a kiln or with a hand torch. Here’s where the magic happens; during the firing process the organic binder holding the silver particles together burns away, fusing the silver (sintering), leaving a solid piece of .999 pure silver. We try to incorporate recycled material into our designs as much as we can.

We package all of our jewellery in recycled glass jars that we save from our homes & studio to keep our products as ‘green’ as possible. The material that covers our jars is recycled too! We encourage our customers to be creative & re-use the jars in their homes or place of work, keeping them in circulation for as long as possible.

Along with using recycled fine silver (PMC) we have also launched a jewellery recycling service in conjunction with London Jewellery week back in June 2010, which has received a great response! Customers can send in their unwanted/broken jewellery which is valued by us and a voucher is offered in exchange for the unwanted pieces. All jewellery sent in is dismantled, cleaned & worked into new designs often teamed with a little something new to add a new lease of life . The more jewellery sent into us, the greener we are becoming, it’s great! To find out more please visit here

We’re extremely excited to be having a new website built! It’s still in the very early stages but we’re hoping to have it live early next year. So expect new ranges, new ways to recycle your old jewellery, new services & new products available more often!! We’re also preparing a competition for our 4th birthday in January 2012, so keep tuned on Twitter or Facebook for more details on that. And of course, we’re going to keep pushing our recycling service in order to revive all those odd beads, earrings, bracelets & necklaces laying unloved at the bottom of all those jewellery boxes out there!

Recycled Christmas

  
$18 Siamese Dream Design

Recycled Paper Producers in Cambodia

Craftwork Cambodia‘s recycled paper producers are a large family that live approximately 20km from the city of Phnom Penh

Mr.Nuth Sam Eng, was born in Prey Veng province, his wife passed away in 1998, he raises his sons and daughters by himself.  He and his family produce recycled paper sheets and note books, to help pay for his children’s higher education at school.

Mr.Nuth Sam Eng’s underprivileged family are working hard to better position themselves for their future.

Recycled paper is recommended for use with greetings cards, notepads, notebooks, price tags, envelopes, gift boxes, wrapping paper, and other craft related use

Shop recycled paper products > here

* DHL have a minimum weight order of 1kilo at $25, but cheaper prices are quoted for a heavier weight, therefore recycled paper products are recommended for wholesale purchase.

Customers are welcome to buy individual pieces, but need to understand that the shipping cost will be $25 up to 1kilo in weight.

Nespresso Coffee Capsule Insects

Swiss Biologist, Alex, reuses discarded Nespresso coffee capsules to create intricate insect art sculptures, inspired by nature.  Documented on his website recycleandplay

Introducing Craftworks Cambodia

It is with absolute pleasure to introduce fair trade ethical producers, Craftworks Cambodia, to Recycled Market.

Craftworks Cambodia did not have an option to sell online, so approached Recycled Market to see if we could help expand their online presence.  We are delighted to help Sapbay’s project, working with producer groups living and working around the capital city of  Phnom Pehn, help artisans achieve a better life of dignity, and better education for their children.

We work very closely with the home based workers and producer groups with disabilities, disadvantages, and vulnerability in the communities of Cambodia.  This project is to help those producers or artisans with life of dignity and better education for their children ”

Freight charges out of Cambodia are ridiculously expensive, but less money for larger weight volume.  It is very hard for Craftworks Cambodia to sell products individually, due to the high cost of shipping ($25 for 1 kilo weight through DHL).

Shipping costs for higher weight volume are much cheaper, therefore we are suggesting that wholesale orders are recommended for orders.

Here is an example chart of DHL shipping costs for weight 20kg and above

Customers are most certainly welcome to buy individual products but need to be aware of very high shipping charges.