Next up in How Can I Recycle This’s Stationery Week theme, we’ve had an email from Agata:

Hi there! I’m still in High School and we use loads and loads of photocopies, mostly black&white.

I want to use them in some crafty way, like jewellery or house ornaments & decos, not just put them in paper savings bin.

Any ideas?

We’ve kinda already covered this before but because Agata wants crafty ideas, I thought I’d post it again to spark that sort of thing.

In the previous comments, ott suggestions papier mache, carrie “hobo notebooks” and Estelle gets her printshop to make stronger bound ones for her. I’ve also made beads from scrap paper in the past – I’ve used coloured paper but I bet the monotone print could make quite interesting beads too.

Any other crafty suggestions?

(Photo by float)

Other stationery items

• How can I make a notebook out of recycled materials?
• How can I reuse or recycle used envelopes?
• How can I reuse or recycle the spiral of a spiral bound notebook?
• How can I reuse or recycle hanging files?
• How can I reuse or recycle glue stick tubes?
• How can I reuse or recycle printer cartridges?

We’re having a bit of a themed week here on Recycle This, focusing on stationery and since stationery items are most frequently used in offices or schools, I thought it might be fitting to have a discussion on ways and ideas to help get organisations to recycle more.

Although I was inspired by the stationery stuff, I’m not just thinking stationery really – but also excess manufacturing materials. Or packaging for food in canteens/staff rooms.

Have you set up, or helped set up, a recycling scheme in your place of work or school?

What works? What doesn’t?

What do you think is most important when setting up a scheme? Should you start small (perhaps focusing on doing one thing) and build up or go straight into recycling everything all the time?

What are the best things to say to management/teachers to get them onboard? What about getting colleagues/classmates motivated too?

Any ideas, suggestions or comments would be very useful.

(Photo by budesigns)

By complete coincidence, I’ve had a run of stationery questions over the last few days so I’m officially naming this week “Stationery Week” on Recycle This ;)

First up, we’ve had an email from Neil asking:

I have been asked about recycling lever arch folders and as they have three main components, I didn’t know how to recycle them. Please could you advise.

I’m a little confused as I can only think of three main components – the outside cardboard folder and the metal mechanism — is there something I’m missing? Either way, I’ve wondered this same thing before and with plastic covered ringbinders too.

Anyone know of any recycling schemes for them as they are? I presume if the cardboard folder bit isn’t plastic coated then once the metal has been pulled out, the cardboard can just go in for recycling as normal – is that the case? Can the metal be recycled too? What about the plastic coated card ones? I suspect they’re very difficult to recycle – anyone know for sure?

What about crafty ideas? If the cardboard is in ok condition, I imagine you could use transform it into a storage binder .. thing. (Words failing me… it’s Monday morning after all.) What I mean is, attach a pocket or strips of elastic to the inside and you could store, for example, knitting needles and the like in there — easy to browse but folds up neatly and sits on a shelf. Anyone done anything like that with it?

Other stationery items

• How can I make a notebook out of recycled materials?
• How can I reuse or recycle used envelopes?
• How can I reuse or recycle the spiral of a spiral bound notebook?
• How can I reuse or recycle hanging files?
• How can I reuse or recycle glue stick tubes?
• How can I reuse or recycle printer cartridges?

As well as finding a myriad of broken belts while tidying our bedroom the other week, I found an assortment of old spectacle cases dotted around the room too.

Most of the glasses have gone bye-bye – either lost or, in the case of my beloved plastic frames last month, snapped in half – but the cases still linger. I use one case for my spare pair and have another for my sunglasses, but that still leaves me with four empties – hard ones from the opticians, from when I got the glasses in the first place. I obviously will try not to accept any more in the future but what can I do with the ones I’ve got now?

While there are a lot of charities that collect old spectacles for redistribution overseas, those that filter them onto Vision Aid Overseas won’t take the cases – because presumably they use their own branded cases or the like during the redistribution process.

So does anyone know of any charities that specifically ask for old cases? Or have any other suggestions of things to do with them?

(Photo by ppreacher)

(Well, snapped is too harsh of a word for it but I can’t think of a better one ;) )

John and I had a major tidy/clean of our bedroom at the weekend and as well as collecting three bags of stuff for the charity shop, a giant bag of unwanted plastic coathangers and organising my crafting fabric stash, I found five old belts dating back over the last few years.

Two are woven straps that fastened with D-loops or those annoying slider buckles that come loose really easily. Both are quite fun designs so I’m thinking maybe casual bag strap?

The other three I got after I realised how much I hated D-loops/slider fasteners and are the more convention stick-and-holes style. The top six inches of those have pretty much fallen off – not surviving the repeated bending over the buckle and through the loops. I could trim the end neatly but would have to lose a bit of weight in order for the shortened belt to fit. And by “a bit of weight”, I mean my pelvis.

So what can I do with them instead? From end to end, they’re about 60cm (24″) and about 3cm (1.5″) wide. They’re pleather – which is, I suspect, why they’ve broken – with metal decorations. One of them (the black one with square studs on it) might work as a wrist cuff or as a “I’m well ‘ard” decoration on a bag ;)

Any other suggestions though?