The Beauty in Single Use Plastics

One of the things I love most about working with reclaimed single-use plastic trash is that, in its own weird way, it’s beautiful.

That may sound nuts, but this stuff is all designed by someone to attract our attention. The bright colors, the fun patterns - all are intended to get our attention in a crowded store.

And I gotta say, they work.

I first started collecting plastic bottle caps because they couldn’t be recycled curbside, and they just looked like they ought to be good for something. And those bright dabs of color looked a lot like dots of paint . . . not surprising since modern acrylic paints are, well, plastic.

Next, I dove into plastic bags and food packaging – I had read an article about fusing plastics to make a kind of material, and I was excited to try it! Besides, there had to be something I could do with all of those frozen burrito wrappers my boyfriend was producing . . .

A lot of the fun for me has been figuring out ways to use these materials in a way that really brings out their beauty!

Thanks to a RACC Project Grant and Cheryl over at Create Plenty, I'll be headed into Trillium Charter High School on February 27th to share the beauty (and the dangers) of single-use plastics with two classes of Earth Sciences students.

We're still in the last phases of fundraising for the project, and you can find the plastic quilt pictured above, "Bird on a Wire" for sale here, at the Create Plenty website.