Beautiful handcrafted gifts in Worcester
Q. What do a reindeer, a pincushion, silly specs and washing up liquid have in common?
A. They’re all found in the Pump House Environment Centre’s Eco Shop.
The Pump House in Worcester is run by environmental charity, the Duckworth Worcestershire Trust and as well as hosting an ethical café and space for meetings, the building aims to showcase sustainable technologies and green products.
Roisin Hanks Project Manager at the The Duckworth Worcestershire Trust, Pump House Environment Centre, explains:
”Products for sale include new environmentally friendly cleaning and personal hygiene products but the Centre is also the only place in Worcester where you can buy refills for these products. In addition, the shop stocks a colourful variety of WREmade kits, Reindeer, Fox and Friend, Jumping Jacks and Fish on a Stick to name just a few.”
WREmade is part of WRE, the Worcestershire Resource Exchange, another project of the Trust. The environmentally friendly products are made by a team of ‘Wremaker’ volunteers using materials such as off cuts and remnants collected from local businesses and industries, which would otherwise have ended up in landfill.
The lovely Wremaker volunteers then help sort, cut and assemble the materials and transform them into beautiful ‘make your own…’ products. Even the boxes are made from rescued cardboard and then lovingly hand stamped with ink.
So, if you are looking for a unique gift or just need to get round to sorting out that pile of dirty dishes and laundry, consider the Pump House Environment Centre as your next stop.
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Sarah Blackwell and Jasmine Loake (students on the sustainability elective) accompanied us on a visit to the WRE to find items for pimping the milk float and other activities during Go Green Week, we were all very impressed with the great atmosphere and range of materials they had on offer. Whilst browsing we spoke with a primary school teacher looking for materials to use in her school’s outdoor area and an artist picking up parts for a sculpture! Its inspiring to think of the volume of material diverted from landfill as well as the savings (resources, energy and monetary) made by customers re-using items rather than buying new. Enjoyed your video link Ben, thanks!
The waste hierarchy was highlighted and put into practice by sustainability students organising Friday of Go Green Week; events encouraging re-use and thinking about consumption practices were on the agenda.
This is a great community project, and it’s obvious from the photo the volunteers enjoy working with you. I’m interested to know where else the materials from WRE end up. Clearly the students love using them to ‘pimp’ the milk float and dress a tree with the Vice Chancellor on the University campus. have you got more examples of how the scrap store items are used?
You can be really creative and build a whole new world for young kids with items from the scrapstore as the video shown here does: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkTc3PYeEPc
Thanks Katy. Look out for more WREmade products coming soon!
Roisin