Outside the Cocoon

My Upcycling Challenge - Item # 1 Coffee Grounds

Since designing my own upcycling logo a few days ago.  (See previous post.)  I have been thinking about how to look at my garbage in a new way.  My logo has two arrows heading in a new direction from the traditional recycling loop and it has caused me to think that there might be at least two alternate second lives for some of my trash.  My challenge for myself is to ask are there two other uses for this item in my hand that I am about to throw away?  I am exempting a few items like used kleenex and paper towels but I at least want to contemplate the item that I am throwing away before I actually toss it. 

My first successful item is coffee grounds.  Right now I am storing them in a mixing bowl under my kitchen sink but I am anxious to finish off the milk in my fridge so I can re-purpose the gallon jug as a new coffee ground receptacle.  My two new uses for coffee grounds are:

1) Fertilizer for my garden and house plants.

2) Coffee / Chocolate Body Scrub.  Yes seriously.  Here is the link Coffee Body Scrub.

I haven't used the coffee grounds for fertilizer yet but I did try the body scrub.  While I don't think it made me look ten years younger or anything I do have to say it felt pretty good and left my skin feeling soft and firm.  It is messy and my bath tub was a little slippery afterwards but I will definitely do it again.

Here are a few links for additional uses for used coffee grounds.

Cocoajava  - Fun things to do with your coffee grounds.

Joey Green's - Wacky Uses for Maxwell House Coffee

If you are a coffee drinker and you are interested in the whole recycling / upcycling movement you should be able to find at least one way to reuse your old coffee grounds. 

Upcycling Logo

Update 3-16-11 

Hi I would love to have your opinion. 

If you are looking for upcycling logos I have created a few different versions which are posted on my other blog here.  I would really appreciate your thoughts.  If you have a minute please vote for your favorite in the comments section. Also...

 

 These logos may be used for school projects, events and promotional material for upcycling.  Please credit this site and or Upcycled Design Lab when using these logos on any printed material.  For internet use always link images back to this post. Please do not alter or use these designs as any part of a company logo. 

 

Thank you.

 

Thanks and regards

Cindy

Original post:

I have recently become addicted to the whole upcycling movement.  I confess that I am not the best recycler but the idea of taking something that is about the become garbage and making it into something that is worth keeping gets my creative juices flowing.  I was even part of it back in the early 80's before it had a name.  I made my Prom dress from fabric that was torn off of the sets of a summer theatre production of Mame.  There we were ripping this pretty fabric off the sets so that they could be painted and reused for the next production and I thought what a waste.  For some reason I blurted out  that I was going to keep the fabric to make my prom dress (never mind that I didn't at this point have a date.)

Fast forward to 2009 where the economic future is being painted as rather dismal, what better time to make more from less.  If you already enjoy upcylcing and or crafting you have probably already been to Etsy.  If you haven't see this sight give it a look.  It is a forum for buying and selling hand made items (some of them are really great upcycled items like this beautiful clutch you would never know it is made from fused plastic bags.) 

Credit for the term "Upcycling" has been given to William Mcdonaugh and Michael Braugart from a book they wrote on ecologically intelligent design called Cradle to Cradle published in 2002, but the origins of upcycling no doubt date all the way back to the caveman when the big thigh bone left over from dinner became a weapon and a hammer. 

So now we even have a name for this process of making trash into treasure, but a quick Google image search provides no universal logo for the new movement.  Everyone knows what the recycling logo looks like so I decided to upcycle it into an upcycling logo.  Here is what I came up with:

From this:                                                    To this:

 

It may not bring me fortune or fame but there it is anyway.

And for anyone who is curious.  Me in my prom dress in 1982.