A team in Somaliland built this helipcopter out of scrap metal and an old van engine. AfriGadget has the scoop (and points out that there is no footage of the thing in flight). This new one isn’t as cool as the Nigerian one AfriGadget posted on a few years back, but is still pretty rad.
Archive for the ‘Upcycling’ Category
Upcycled helicopter
Monday, March 29, 2010Cassette clearinghouse
Thursday, March 25, 2010Rob Walker has constructed a “monster post” on “The idea of the cassette” over at MURKETING. Go. Click through. Get lost. It’s rich and entertaining and full of creative upcycling and recycling project ideas.
Related: This summer Walker and co posted a series on music on unconsumption that also featured neat cassette-themed links. That series coincided with the immediate aftermath of the contested presidential elections in Iran and inspired this everydaytrash post on technology, human rights and creative resuse.
Semirelated: Awesome Tapes from Africa is a site worth following (the name says it all). I discovered it via my friend Erica. Thanks, Erica!
Not that related but also awesome: There is a kid on YouTube who calls himself CassetteMaster. He is obsessed with collecting vintage tape recorders and making videos about them. He has a bit of a cult following. I am trying hard not to get sucked in, but these videos kind of lull you into addiction. Especially ones involving other people interacting with the awkward CassetteMaster. Like all things to do with audio and the absurd, this link came to me via Flex Unger.
Dead Computers
Wednesday, March 24, 2010Check out the winners of Instructables’ Dead Computers Contest.
Crane game
I wish I had a dead computer so I could make my very own crane game. I’d charge 25 cents a go and use the money to fund trashtastic reporting field trips. via MAKE
Upcycling your card
Thursday, March 18, 2010The Etsy Trashion blog has a handy pair of posts up about eco-friendly business cards up. The first covers how to make them yourself, the second how to get them printed.
DIY businesss cards
Several years into garblogging, I still don’t use a card. It’s a waste issue that’s had me conflicted for a while. Maybe this year I’ll get it together and make a snappy set of DIYs.
Recycling design competition
Monday, March 1, 2010
4th RecyclingDesignPrize 2010
Recycle, comost or trash?
Wednesday, February 24, 2010Ever had trouble distinguishing among the above? McSweeney’s offers this helpful guide.
Rhinos
Saturday, February 20, 2010Last weekend while in Uganda for work, I had the amazing opportunity to visit the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary in Nakitoma. We drove out to where the rhinos graze and peeked in on a few of them sleeping.
Taleo, the dominant male
The guide and sanctuary brochure were full of all kinds of interesting rhino factoids. For example, the term “White” rhino derives not from the color of the animals but from the dutch word for wide (and they are). They started the sanctuary with four rhinos from Kenya then got two more donated from the US. The offspring are the first rhinos born in Uganda in at least 28 years. Pretty cool. And want to hear something cute? Because the first baby was born to a Kenyan dad and American mom, they named him Obama.What, you might ask, does any of this have to do with garbage? Well, for one thing, the sanctuary itself is an ecotourism destination, low impact, solar powered, etc. More on Northern Uganda and low waste traveling to come (in the meantime, check out Uganda trash photos on the everydaytrash.com Facebook page).
For another thing, my friend Flex Unger just sent me this amazing link to a roundup of used tire sculptures from around the world.
Tire rhino by artist Ji Yong Ho
My favorite, of course, is this rhino by Korean artist Ji Yong Ho. According to this Theme Magazine article:
To Ji, rubber symbolizes mutation. “The product is from nature,” from the white sap of latex trees. “But here it’s changed. The color is black. The look is scary.” He tried experimenting with clay and bronze, but the sculptures looked too much like robots. “Rubber is very flexible, like skin, like muscles,” he explains. It gives him more freedom in capturing the animals’ expressivity—the horse’s wistful glance or the way the hyena cocks its hind leg, ready to spring into an attack.
Artful upcycling.
UPDATE: Rhinos, rhinos everywhere. As soon as I posted on the White rhinos in Uganda, I read this sweet story about Sumatran rhonos in Indonesia. Also, for those who may not know or remember, the official everydaytrash.com mascot is a rhino made of flip flops named P.C.
White Goat
Monday, February 1, 2010Office paper to toilet paper. Amazing. Thanks for the tip, Brendan!
via Uber Gizmo and BornRich.org
Garbage Warrior
Wednesday, January 20, 2010Attn: New Yorkers
UnionDocs is showing Garbage Warrior—the documentary about radical sustainable architect, Michael Reynolds—on Friday, January 29th, @ 7:30 pm. Director Oliver Hodge will be on hand for a Q&A. And at least 50% of the everydaytrash.com team plans to attend.
Since we first blogged about this film in 2007 and 2008, it has traveled the festival circuit racking up awards. Check it out if you’re in the area and keep an eye out if you’re elsewhere.
Thanks for the tip, Oriana!
Reblog: Spectacle
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Chandelier made from eyeglasses
From Very Very Fun (via uncomsumption and Dudecraft):
Salvage pioneer Stuart Haygarth has created an eye-catching eyeglass masterpiece, turning discarded glasses into a gorgeously green glowing chandelier. Spectacle is an optical chandelier assembled from 1020 pairs of discarded prescription glasses, with a smaller size constructed from 620 pairs. The refracted light from the lenses makes fluid shadows that play across walls creating an aqueous lighting effect that shimmers as much as it delights.
White elephant party
Tuesday, January 12, 2010My friends Jen and Matt have an amazing Brooklyn duplex, which they are very generous about putting to use to throw fabulous fundraisers. This weekend they hosted a white elephant party to benefit City Harvest.
Host Matt takes bids on BBQ artist Don's donation
For those who don’t know, a white elephant is gift you get but don’t want and City Harvest is an NYC-based nonprofit that rescues 25 million pounds of excess food from restaurants, stores and farms every year and redistributes that food to hungry families. Both concepts re-purpose what would otherwise be thrown away. By my count that’s double zero waste.
To spice things up, this party began as a silent auction. Instead of trading gifts, we bid cash that would go toward City Harvest. The most and least popular items were then put up for live auction—with numbered paddle bidding and everything, just like Christies. To boost the total at the end of the night, our friend and local BBQ legend Don put a party in his backyard up for bid.
Final tally: over $1100 raised and unknown pounds of unwanted gifts matched with people who might actually use them. I hope this idea catches on and becomes an annual tradition.
Cheese grater lanterns
Friday, January 8, 2010It was my roommate’s birthday last night and to celebrate it a bunch of us went out for fancy pizza at this new joint on Atlantic Ave. I dig their light fixtures, which whether or not they are upcycled or made new are a great idea for reusing an old cheese grater. Might just have to hang an old rusty one in my kitchen.
Cheese grater lanterns at La Pizzetta
Zero waste beer
Wednesday, January 6, 2010My friends Joe and Jasmine live a charmed life in San Francisco. I know because I read their blog, Beer at Joe’s where they chronicle their adventures in tasting and pairing and even brewing beer. Today, Jasmine posted her recipe for spent grain beer bread, an innovative way to reuse the grains leftover after Joe attempts a batch of home brew. Sounds delicious. And like it would make a good side to some of the Reused/Recycled dishes featured on Italicious.
Trash Deactivation contest
Sunday, January 3, 2010Calling all trashionistas: Ecotopia, a Polish website dedicated to fashion made from recycled materials, is hosting a contest to find the next great trashion design.
Ecotopia
Contestants are asked to:
Create a new cloth, accessory or jewellery, which can be manufactured from items, things, materials which are not needed any more, redundant or broken and should be thrown away as thrash. Please, try not to buy new things – try to use only what you have available at hand. Strive to maintain simplicity in your project, but do not forget about the resourcefulness, comfort and materials which are available for your use.
Finalists and an ultimate winner will receive prizes and be featured in an online publication, “Trash Book”. Entries are due by February 1. For a complete list of rules, click here (and scroll down for English). Via the ETSY Trashion Team blog.
Waste auditing
Saturday, January 2, 2010Photographer Jordan Manley‘s usual subjects are the practitioners and stunning natural backdrops of mountain biking sports and skiing. But he also happens to be the son of an environmental engineer. Manley recently sent us a link to this rad photo essay, “A look back at…garbage,” documenting the dirty work he has been roped into doing for his dad over the years, mainly a recent gig “auditing garbage” or sorting trash to see what could be salvaged, reused, recycled or converted into energy.
Photo credit: Jordan Manley
Describing the task, Manley says:
Despite the messy nature of the job, it was an interesting type of surveillance into people’s lives, you can tell a lot about a household from what they throw away. It took us to some interesting places as well.
everydaytrash 