Rescue that Trash!

Have you ever found a "junked" item on the berm or in the back of a thrift shop, and found a cool new use for it? If you happen to have a rediscovery or reuse story, send it our way, and we'll feature your story on our blog!

Here's my trash rescue story:

On by walk home one day, I noticed a neighbor had set a huge, ornate, gilt style frame out with the trash. The corners were crumbling, and some of the carved decoration had chipped away. It could have been crushed down in the garbage truck, but I saw potential, so I grabbed it and brought it to my backyard. With a can of spray paint, I painted the entire frame glossy black, so it had a sort of sleek, modern look to it. I then placed an ad for the frame on Craigslist, and within a week, I sold it for $50!

Sometimes it pays not to pass up trash!

If you have a story of a way you reused or recycled a found object, let us know, and we'll post your story on our blog!

Another addition to the Unconsumption Uncollection

Since just about any type of trash can be made into jewelry, the Uncollection un-assignment didn't seem like real project without some sort of jewelry addition making an appearance.

These earrings are made from #6 plastic and then shrinky dinked with the Mr. (and Ms.) Cart logo.

You can get the brief how-to make recycled shrinky dink jewelry all on your own. You can find #6 plastic in things like deli lids and other take-out containers.

And then challenge yourself with an un-project. Add something to the Uncollection and post your photo. It's a great way to unconsume and still be really excited about the new-to-you object.

Join the Uncollection!

The super nice folks over at Unconsumption recently challenged me to reuse their logo and ReMake something from my book. The idea is simple - they are making
"the logo 'available' for anybody who wants to use it on things they already own. The concept in a nutshell: Take an old T-shirt you don’t really wear anymore, print our logo on it — and it becomes, on some level, a brand new T-shirt!"

Right up my recycling alley, right? And that logo of Mr. Cart is just super cute.

Check out the projects I (re)made for yourself. And then give it a try! Share it on their facebook page and spread the Unconsumption word. It's making something old that you already own, new again.

Celebrate Earth Day with free projects!

Happy Earth Day everyone!!

We've had a great Earth Week with loads of events. If you're in the NYC area, there are a few events to go!

We love celebrating Earth Week by ReMaking things. This year we have an extra reason to celebrate - our new book, ReMake It! is now on store shelves.

If you don't own the book just yet, but are itching to ReMake something today, then download some of the bonus projects over at Sterling Publishing's ReMake It site.

It includes projects like this umbrella turned rain hat, a tissue box soccer game, button down shirt purse, and lots more.

ReMake your Earth Day great!

Coat Rack Design Challenge

Tiffany, always a junkie for upcycling projects, gave me a challenge recently to create a coat rack for the RePlayGround design studio.

The design rules were as follows:
1) The coat rack must be able to be mounted to the wall
2) It must hang at least six items
3) The rack must be made out of repurposed items!

With these design aspects in mind, I decided to give some old wood coat hangers an unconventional twist with this Upside Down Coat Hanger Rack:



I started by cutting off all but 1" of one side of each coat hanger. This left enough space to mount the coat hangers onto a scrap wood 2 X 4. Next, we drilled screws from the back of the wood plank into the cut part of the coat hanger, making sure to space each hanger 4" apart. This took one person to line up the hanger to the wood and hold everything in place, while a second person screwed the pieces together. For extra security, I dabbed a bit of wood glue to the sawed off part of each hanger to make sure the hangers won't twist out of place when in use!



Now our coats are hanging around the design studio in upcycled style!