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Mason Jars for all Occasions

“Treat your love like a firefly, like it only gets to shine for a little while. 

Catch it in a mason jar, with holes in the top, and run like hell to show it off.” 

[American country singer, Miranda Lambert]

I love Mason Jars.

I mean, who doesn’t?

And they don’t just have to be used for pickling. Look at all the ways you can use them  …

Mason jars

Images from left to right:

Mason jar chandelier via Pinterest

The Mason Jar Cocktail Shaker from Who’d Have Thought?

Outdoor hanging mason jar vases via Pinterest

Cutesy sewing containers-cum-pin cushions via Martha Stewart

Mason jar herb garden via Camille Styles

Tea light holders via Tiny White Daisies

Pink lemonade receptacles via Pawleys Island Posh

Painted mason jar vases via Pinterest

 

Pedal Power

What do you do with crapped out bicycles nobody wants anymore?

You turn them into pedal power.

A Guatemalan NGO in San Andrés Itzapa, called Maya Pedal, reconditions donated bicycles to make a whole raft of pedal-powered machines they call Bicimaquinas, which are designed to help local communities in all sorts of ways that would normally require electricity or hand power.

These Bicimaquinas range from a mobile water pump to a bicycle nut sheller, a kitchen blender (yep!) and a bicycle mill/corn thresher. They are easy to maintain, produce no pollution, free the user from rising energy costs and provide exercise.

What a great idea!

Maya Pedal relies on the help and work of a mix of locals and volunteers in their Guatemalan workshop and their goal is to be …“a center of pedal power research and development and an information resource for NGO’s promoting appropriate technology and small scale, sustainable agriculture.”

It’s also got me thinking about the developed world with its rising obesity and rising costs of electricity … Can you see where I’m going here?

What if, household members shared a daily cycling routine (say, half an hour to an hour each a day) that would help power their home’s electricity (or, maybe, power the dishwasher or make a smoothie), which would, in turn, reduce their bills and improve their health and fitness …?

What do you think, too far-fetched?

Newspaper dogs

I love my dog, I truly do. But how adorable are these?

What’s more, there are no feet to walk, no poop to clean up, no mouths to feed.

Newspaper dogs from Olive & Cocoa via trendhunter.com

Problem is, there’s also no tail to wag, no fur to pat, no panting greeting at the front door …

Maggie and Oatmeal can be found and bought at Olive & Cocoa

Blowing out the light: The Surface Tension Lamp

Some people have the darnedest ideas. Then they make them real. This light is one of them.

Surface Tension Light via Designfront

The ‘Surface Tension Lamp’ is like an illuminated bubble blower. When the light is turned on it creates continuous bubbles that grow and pop, grow and pop …

Say what?

Surface Tension Light from Booo Studio

The idea came about when Dutch design group Booo! Studio challenged three designers to create innovative lamps using LED technology. The three-woman Swedish design group, Front, came up with this lamp that is so original it pretty much blows your mind (sorry, for the pun!). This is what they say about their creation:

“A bubble is brief, and bursts at your touch. But while it lasts, it catches the light and reflects the room like a multi-coloured temporary structure. We wanted to create a constantly changing lamp that combines the most ephemeral of lampshades with an LED light source that will last for 50,000 hours. In the time it takes the LED to burn out, the lamp will have had 3 million different globe shades.”

With the help of electrical designer, Göran Nordahl, they were able to make their idea reality, and here’s what he says about the materials he used initially:

“I made the first version out of found parts e.g. an insecticide bottle, a small laptop fan, a tiny model servo, an adhesive furniture glide and an extra furry black pipe-cleaner. The new improved version is more robust and contains nice 3D printed parts and a much more powerful LED.”

The first prototype was shown at the Milan Furniture Fair in 2012 and then, this year, was nominated by the London Design Museum for a Design of the Year.

It didn’t win but if you happen to be in London you can see the lamp in person along with the other design nominees until July 7.

Interview: Maria Cristina Bellucci and her coloured-pencil jewellery

Maria Cristina Bellucci coloured pencil jewellery

A beautiful melding of art, costume and functionality are all at work here with this range of jewellery by Rome-based, Maria Cristina Bellucci.

But what I think is most astounding is that they are all made from coloured pencils. Yep. Coloured pencils. How amazing are they?

Having studied stage design at the Rome Academy of Fine Arts and jewellery art techniques at the San Giacomo School of Ornamental Arts in Rome; taken a microflaming masterclass with Master Giovanni Corvaja at Le Arti Orafe in Lucca and an Intensive course, Alchimia in Florence, Maria’s creative background is as varied as the many exhibitions in which she has featured.

Intrigued, I wanted to find out more. Here she tells me how she started and what inspires her. And a big thanks to Maria for answering in English! (I’ve done only minor edits to keep her voice true).

Tell me about your background – where are you from?

I was born in a village in the north of Rome. I spent a happy childhood free to explore nature with friends. I’ve loved art since I was a child, I spent a lot of time looking at art books and drawing. After my study in classics I decided to enter the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome where I studied stage design.

What made you go into jewellery design?  

Initially I was only interested in art; I wanted to be a painter. [But] I needed to explore different jobs – I worked as a restorer, an illustrator, a background designer for cartoons. [I also worked] in decorating costumes and accessories for stage use. It was a very interesting period for using very different materials. It was for fantasy costumes rather than historical reconstruction. I worked with great costume designers like Danilo Donati and to see them work has been an experience that gave me a lot.

But in all these situations I needed more; I didn’t feel completely satisfied. So I decided to find something else and I found contemporary jewellery.

MCB Jewellery

Maria working in her studio

I see you are based in Rome – does the city influence the way you work? If so, how?

Rome has given me a lot. I’ve found the historical beauty of the city very full of beauty. In the meantime I needed to make contemporary art and I visited a lot of ancient places in the city. I did a course in medieval art history at the University and visited medieval sites around Italy.

I’ve had the possibility to meet my country through its past; it’s important to know the past if you want to do something new. Rome is a place where I’ve met many interesting people [who have given] me a lot.

Tell me more about the ‘Intensive course, Alchimia’ you did in Florence? How has that helped with your designing today?

I studied the classical goldsmith’s technique. I wanted to follow a course at Alchimia to expand my technical knowledge in the specific field of contemporary jewellery and I have now reached this goal. I also [learnt] a different method of working and have started working with epoxy resin.

You’ve been a freelance designer since 1999 – was it hard to go out on your own?

Sure it was hard but it was my way. Now I understand that hard things may be better than easy things, we have the possibility to learn more than with the easy ones. Now I’m happy to try very different experiences.

Tell me about your different designs – do you work with the material first or an idea?

In my last work, I began with an interest in a particular material. Common materials are interesting for me because they are so banal but beautiful. So it’s interesting for me to make them more interesting. It’s not important to impress with a particular technique. I’m not interested in technique; I’m interested in an idea.

At the moment, I’m working with a different method – I begin with an idea and I’m looking at how to express this idea. So it’s necessary first do research, followed by a visual search and finally a study on the material appropriate to create a jewel that expresses the original idea.

Your jewellery made from coloured pencils looks amazing – it’s hard to believe such a basic, simple thing like a coloured pencil could be turned into jewellery. Tell me where this idea came from and how you made it come to life?

At the time I was working a lot with silver and experimenting with different materials. I was looking for something without a clear idea and no expectations. I worked beginning with an attraction to a material. I began using only one cut colored pencil and silver. Then I added the coloured pencils with hexagonal shapes and found that the surface with wood and colors inside was interesting, so I began to use it with different shapes. For me, it’s a work like [any of the] others but I see that people are very interested in the idea. I realised that the idea to [take] something out of its context produces an amazing effect.

What’s been a career highlight to date?

I hope the career highlight will be in the future. Up until now I’ve been happy to get international work. I want to follow myself and keep getting better. This is all that I want.

Have there been any challenges you’ve faced so far? Tell me about them.

My first desire was to be free and independent and to be able to take care of myself. Then I was able to devote [myself] full-time to this beautiful work, so I could [continue] with researching.

Now the challenge is to balance work and life.

Can you give us an insight into a typical day of Maria Cristina Bellucci?

I usually begin my day with the alarm clock ringing to wake up at the right time to get my daughter to school. Then I get back home and work until 4 p.m when I have to go to school again to pick up my daughter. Then I have free time to stay with her and friends. So I usually work from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m, when the work is very intense. I need to work again after 4 p.m and sometimes in the weekend. I spend a lot of time at my computer in addition to working on jewellery. In the evening I stay with my family, we eat together and relax after dinner. Twice a week in the evening I have my wonderful tai chi practice. I get a lot of strength from it. With practice the body changes, developing suppleness and great strength, and the mind becomes more open.

Who or what motivates you?

Curiosity – curiosity to know unknown things, people and places. Life is a research in which you can choose your street to go ahead. The interesting [part] of the job is you always need to get new skills.

What things, people, places are inspiring you at the moment?

Nature is great. I need to be with nature – every day I must be outside in my garden taking care of it. Spirituality is very important. I’m interested in [understanding] human beings. I’m also interested in philosophy.

Do you have light bulb moments or do ideas form over time?

Both. The idea usually arrives like a bolt. This produces a state of happiness and excitement. Then I need to elaborate the idea with manual work and add other ideas to it. What I try to do is enter in a state of grace, like a meditation, so I need to stay in peace with my mind open and relaxed. To obtain that situation I need to do what I want and follow my inspiration.

Bicycles: Innovations and Art

“I want to ride my bicycle, I want to ride my bike …” 

 

Lyrics from from ‘Bicycle Race’ by Queen.

Images from top left to right: Trent Jansen’s Cyclesign bicycle reflector @ Who’d Have Thought?; We Heart It; Frankly Benjamin; White Dog blog; Greca; trick cyclists at the Canadian National Exhibition c. 1920 via Toronto Then and Now.

Interview: Debbie Watkins and FunkyJunk Recycled

How many times do you say you’d love to make a difference to the world but do nothing about it?

Well, enterprising self-confessed ‘high fliers’, Brit Debbie Watkins and Dutch Marc Lansu not only decided to give a little back by volunteering overseas for a year but ended up ditching their old jobs and their old lives to transform Cambodia’s exploding plastic bag population.

That was back in the mid-2000s. Now they have a burgeoning social enterprise business based in Chamcar Bei that employs local Cambodians to make funky homewares and accessories using discarded plastic bags, as well as a non-profit travel business, Carpe Diem Travel Limited, that gives international visitors unique and personal tours of the country.

Since they began, they have single-handedly (or perhaps multi-handedly!) significantly reduced the numbers of plastic bags that were littering fields and roadsides by more than 200,000. Each bag is carefully washed and dried and then guillotined into strips to make usable ‘yarn’ that can be crocheted into hardwearing and waterproof cushions, baskets, bags, purses. A single floor cushion, for example, is made up of about 1200 bags.

Intrigued by how two disconnected people ended up as both life and business partners, I decided to find out more.

Here’s what Debbie had to say …

Debbie Watkins of FunkyJunk

Debbie Watkins in the BBC World Challenge video

Tell us about yourselves.  What are your backgrounds?

We met in Cambodia while undertaking voluntary work for local organisations. We both had previously been career “high fliers” – me as Head of Business Development for a technology firm in the City of London, and Marc as a Customer Advisor for a Dutch Bank. We had originally – independently from one another – taken a one-year career break to travel around the world and had decided to stay for longer in Cambodia to “do something useful”. We became captivated by the country, and in particular the warmth and sincerity of the local people which has triumphed over the tragedy and heartbreak inflicted on the country during the genocidal regime of the Khmer Rouge.

What made you decide to set up Carpe Diem Travel? And why Cambodia – what captivated you about the place?

The idea of starting a travel business came from two directions. We wanted to share with the outside world the places we had seen, the people we’d met – to enable a real insight into the country, its history and people.  During our time in Cambodia, we’d also met many wonderful people who, despite obvious intelligence, integrity and initiative were unable to find anything but the most menial work.  Over a few beers one evening we came up with the idea to combine the two aims – providing work, training and a sense of purpose to local people in need, while offering international travellers the kind of up-close, personal experiences rarely encountered in “package” tours. And so Carpe Diem (Latin for “seize the day”) Travel was born.

Where did the idea to start FunkyJunk come from? Clearly sustainable practice is very important to you – so why did you decide to focus on reusing plastic bags?

The original idea started in 2005, as a direct result of our leading tours throughout the countryside. Plastic bags were everywhere! We originally started picking them up, but, of course, the next time we came there were more. So we decided we needed to find a way to reduce the problem, with the aim of finding a low-cost, low-technology solution that could achieve a number of objectives:

- Motivate local people to collect plastic bags from the streets and fields
- Convert the collected bags into something that had a value and could be sold
- Create jobs for local underprivileged people
- Raise awareness of the importance of not littering.

Can you give us an insight into the workings of FunkyJunk? Who are the others you work with?

FunkyJunk initially instigated a partnership with a local NGO in a rural area in the South of Cambodia, who helped us to identify potential producers and provided a small building in which to work.

FunkyJunk Recycled was formally registered as a Community Interest Company (CIC) in the UK in 2009. The requirements and obligations of this legal form can be read at www.cicregulator.gov.uk.  This structure was chosen for a number of reasons:

•       The UK Government requires CICs to achieve and report on the social activities that they stated in their original registration
•       CIC status restricts the dividends that can be paid to shareholders, so encouraging social investors who do not expect excessive returns, and ensuring the majority of profits are reinvested in the social activities
•       UK reporting requirements ensure that all accounting is transparent
•       In order to manage sales for a number of centres established around the world, and provide reassurance to purchasers that advance payments are secure.

What does a typical day involve?

I don’t really have a typical day. I actually have a full time job, so my involvement is more at the strategic, rather than operational level. Marc deals with day-to-day operations and he works on a daily basis with our in-country production team to make sure that our clients are delighted with their purchases! He also visits Cambodia regularly – we lived there for six years and so have a deep personal commitment to helping communities and the environment – and manages volunteers who contribute expert skills as well as ensuring that everything is running smoothly and that our team is happy and motivated. We live in the Netherlands now; we moved here from Bangladesh in the summer.

What’s been the most challenging part of this initiative?

We have had lots of challenges!

Who or what motivates you?

The number of plastic bags we’ve cleared – over 200,000 so far! And our continuing organic growth, offering more training and employment opportunities to more people.

What’s been a career highlight to date?

Being a finalist in the BBC World Challenge (one of only 12 from 640 applicants), and being featured in a documentary on BBC World.

The BBC World Challenge is a global competition aimed at championing and rewarding projects and businesses that show enterprise and innovation at a grassroots level.

[You must watch the video here as it’s amazing to see exactly what they do, how the products are made and what a difference Debbie and Marc have made]

Do you have new designs/ideas in the pipeline and/or can you discuss future projects?*

This is confidential, I’m afraid … but we will update you as soon as anything happens!

FunkyJunk

Chair Art: Art Chair

YOY

The perfect merging of art and functionality by Tokyo-based design studio, Yoy Idea, founded by Naoki Ono, a spatial designer and Yuki Yamamoto, a product designer.

YOY

A seat painting you can hang on your wall.

YOYOr a seat you can sit in.

The frame is made of wood and aluminum, and covered in an elastic fabric with the texture of canvas. It comes as a stool, chair or sofa. This work is currently featuring at the Salone Satellite 2013 in Milan.

What would you do with this chair art/art chair? Sit in it or hang it?

{Images by Yasuko Furukawa}

The Recycled Orchestra and Landfill Harmonic

The Recycled Orchestra

Made by Tito Romero from a tin water pipe, metal bottle caps, plastic buttons, metal spoon and fork handles.

Who hasn’t, as a child (or even as an adult: cue chopsticks!), made a crude instrument from something non-instrumental around the house or garden?

Thought nothing of it, did you?

But what if playing that fork-drumstick on a saucepan-drum became a transformative experience? Life-changing, even?

A few years ago, Nicolás ‘Cola’ Gómez, a Paraguayan  rubbish collector living in one of the area’s poorest slums, Cateura (which is literally built on a landfill), not only decided to make instruments for the kids from stuff he’d collected from the dump but went one step further.

With the help of Favio Chávez, who opened a music school in Cateura, he started The Recycled Orchestra, in which a group of children learn and play music on upcycled garbage – instruments such as violins made  from oil drums, flutes from water pipes and spoons, guitars from packing crates.

The Recycled Orchestra

Made by Nicolas “Cola” Gomez from a metal glue canister, fork, used strings, recycled wood and tuning pegs.

As you can imagine it has brought immense joy, fun, hope and focus to the children, many of whom were destined for a life of gangs, violence and drug-dependency.

Then, a couple of years ago, La Orquesta de Instrumentos Reciclados caught the attention of fellow Paraguayan documentary producer, Alejandra Amarilla Nash. With an eye for philanthropy and community service, Alejandra decided to film The Recycled Orchestra and some of its children and families with the goal of taking their story global.

Called Landfill Harmonic, the film is described as ‘following the orchestra as it takes its inspiring spectacle of trash-into-music around the world … It shows how trash and recycled materials can be transformed into beautiful sounding musical instruments, but more importantly, it brings witness to the transformation of precious human beings.’

The Recycled Orchestra

Most of the children in the Recycled Orchestra are from Cateura or surrounding areas, in the heart of Paraguay.

Alejandra and her Landfill Harmonic team are continuing to film this year but need more funds in order to achieve their three main aims: to complete the documentary; create the Landfill Harmonic Social Movement and infrastructure to help other places like Cateura; and take the orchestra on a world tour.

Cue Kickstarter.

Drum roll: They have only 21 days to fulfill their goal.

I highly recommend you pop on over to Kickstarter and read more about the people behind The Recycled Orchestra and the dreams of Alejandra and Landfill Harmonic.

The Recycled Orchestra

Interview: The Bookish Life

You may remember I did a story on an Australian husband and wife team making beautiful journals out of vintage books (Natalie and Ben of Rebound Books)? And you know how they say we’ve all got a twin somewhere else in the world? Well, I think I’ve just found Natalie and Ben’s twins in Wisconsin in the US: husband and wife team, Chad and Andrea Thorson of The Bookish Life.

They also have a love affair of books and a dislike of throwing them out which has turned into a business they run ‘out-of hours’ alongside their ‘day jobs’. They use snippets of text from vintage books and make them into jewellery and accessories. So you can literally wear your favourite book on your sleeve – or neck, or wrist, or hair! I decided to find out more about Chad and Andrea and their cute little literary life. Here’s what Andrea had to say …

The Bookish Life

Andrea and Chad and two of their favourite books

Tell me about yourselves. You say on your blog that you are a husband and wife team – what are your backgrounds?

Chad and I have been married for almost 15 years. We’ve always been creative. During our college years, Chad focused on Fine Art and I focused on Graphic Design. He worked in libraries and bookstores from the time he was in high school up until just a few years ago. He’s now working for a company that captions phone calls for the hearing impaired. I have worked at a phone company for nearly 12 years, but have always had a passion to make things. Chad and I have always shared a passion to own our own business and hope to make it a full time gig in the future. We have an eight-year-old son and a six-year-old daughter who are creative, hilarious and keep us busy!

Where did the idea to start The Bookish Life come from and when?  

Our business has evolved a lot since it started around 2006. As long as I can remember, I have been a collector of old magazines, books, comics, vintage wrapping paper, maps … just about anything that has a snippet of something that catches my eye. I first started using these things to make collage-style cards and art. When we started making and selling our creations, we made a huge array of different things ranging from recycled magazine gift bags to French text magnets to screen printed clothing with Chad’s artwork. We were just making things that we liked but didn’t really have a clear vision for our business. We used books in our work, but also used many other mediums. Our business was called ‘Space Oddities’ back then. It fit the randomness of what we were doing at the time.

I really think what turned the corner and made our business more ‘bookish’ was a box of water-damaged Tolkien books. Chad was working at a used bookstore in 2008 and brought home an entire box of Tolkien books – dozens of them that were going to be thrown away due to damage. I started using pieces of the books, little by little. I made note cards with text from the “A Shortcut to Mushrooms” chapter of The Fellowship of the Ring along with little mushroom embellishments. I made LOTR text magnets and book cover pins. Chad drew a Gandalf image that we screen-printed on actual book pages. And little by little, we used those books in so many different ways. Our line of items continued to grow, but we still didn’t have a clear vision.

We expanded our literary line a year or so after we started selling our items at a local weekly farmers’ market. We had a lot of great feedback about the recycled book items. We loved how quickly the literary items sparked conversations with so many different kinds of people. At a certain point, the other mishmash of items we had been making previously just didn’t seem to fit anymore with our expanding line of literary goodies. We wanted focus and cohesiveness. We came up with the name ‘The Bookish Life’ in the summer of 2011 and went ahead full force with our concept.

How did you go about making this happen?

It was gradual and still is a work in progress! It’s very much a labour of love. We would both love to quit our day jobs and make this our full-time gig right now, but I think this is still a few years off.

How do you fit The Bookish Life around the rest of your life? 

We both work full-time during the day while our kids are at school. We’re lucky enough to have similar schedules, so we can fit in some quality family time most nights. After the kids are tucked into bed, we switch to bookish mode and get to work answering emails, updating our shop and filling and packaging orders. The kids often come with us when we vend at shows and my eight-year-old especially loves to help at our table. We vend at a local farmers’ market on Saturdays April through November and we usually all go and make a fun family day of it. I really enjoy the shows and markets. I love meeting people and talking about good books, exposing my kids to unique handmade art and new people! When we started our business we were doing a lot less and were way more stressed out. Somehow, now that we are much busier with it, we have managed to find balance.

Where do you go to source your books? 

We actually have a pretty big collection of damaged books that Chad saved over his many years working at used bookstores and libraries. We also source books from garage sales and thrift stores, but try hard to use books that are already damaged or very well loved. I really feel that when a book is already damaged, or if there are a million copies sitting in basements and attics across the world being neglected, I would rather see it in a piece of jewellery instead of being gone forever. The great thing is that one book goes such a long way! I cut the book covers to make into bookmarks to give away at the market, use book pages for wrapping and embellishments on packages and, of course, snippets of text in our jewellery, cards and accessories.

Have you made any amazing/unexpected discoveries along the way? Tell me about them.  

As far as books go, we find treasures all the time! We buy a lot more books for our personal collection than we do for our business. The amazing discoveries are usually too good to tear into pieces.

Have you ever had a ‘who’d have thought?’ moment? Tell me about it. 

Yes! It may have been what sparked my motivation to start our business! Chad was working at a used bookstore around 2004, and I saw the recycle bin that they used for the books they throw out. It was crazy! They must have thrown out hundreds of books every week, probably more. These books were going to be gone forever. I was shocked. All of a sudden, I started looking at my giant collection of books, magazines, comics and other random tidbits in a different way. I got excited about saving these things instead of feeling guilty for using them.

What’s been your favourite creation so far?

I don’t know if I can choose! I have so much fun with every item. I think that every time we make something new, it’s my favourite thing. I especially love ideas that Chad and I come up with together and collaborate on.

What do you do in your spare time?

I love baking, hunting for treasures at thrift stores, collecting records, craft time with my kids and, of course, reading a good book.

What are some of your favourite books?

Chad: The Lord of the Rings series (Tolkien,) I Claudius (Robert Graves,) Fahrenheit 451 (Ray Bradbury,) Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk Rock (Legs McNeil & Gillian McCain.)

Andrea:  The Stranger (Albert Camus,) To Kill a Mockingbird (Harper Lee,) I’m a Stranger Here Myself (Bill Bryson,) Like Hell (Ben Weasel.)

What inspires you?

Spring. Words. Coffee. Simplicity. A perfect song. A great book.

Do you have new designs or ideas for The Bookish Life in the future? 

We have a few jewellery items right now that pair book text with Chad’s illustrations. Here’s an example (below) – one of our literary bracelets featuring text from a book of poems by Edgar Allan Poe and Chad’s drawings.  We want to make this concept a bigger part of our work so that each piece is even more unique and one-of-a-kind.

The Bookish Life - Literary bracelet

And you can find some of Andrea and Chad’s pieces in our store here.

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