Long-time Recycle This friend Alice has emailed to ask about making a large wine rack:

I make loads of home brew wine and beer, and I could really do with a very big wine rack. Any ideas on how I could make one out of recycled stuff?

It’d need to hold at least 36 wine bottles, and/or a similar number of beer bottles. Doesn’t need to look especially pretty though ‘cos I store it all in the shed until it’s drinkable. All that liquid and glass is very heavy though, so it’d need to be very strong and stable.

I found this great page with lots of wine rack designs – and it might be possible to make some of those from recycled/reclaimed materials — for example, the pipe one near the bottom of the page.

Has anyone made any wine racks by reusing or recycling stuff? What did you use? Anyone got any suggestions of things that could be upcycled/reclaimed?

We’ve had an email from Sandra:

We’ve replaced some old fashioned doors with glass in them. What can we do with them now?

I’ve got an eBay saved search which looks for cheap big used home/garden stuff in my local area – and there are always doors on there. Most don’t sell for a lot of money but at least they’ll be reused. There is, of course, Freecycle/Freegle too.

I’ve seen old doors – glazed or not – used creatively around gardens and allotments — properly weather-protected, they can be used as fencing and old panelled doors are a lot prettier than garden gates in a shabby chic/secret garden style. There is a path through some allotments near where we walk the dog sometimes; tall box hedging on each side but every now and then there is a fancy old door leading into a plot – very fun.

Depending on the extent/position of the glazing, it may be worth using them for other purposes in the garden too – for example, quite woody doors can be sliced in half lengthways to make planking for raised beds or the like, but doors including more, particularly clear, glass could be incorporated into a greenhouse or used to make a cold frame.

Any other ideas? Particularly any non-garden ideas? I think I’m a bit obsessed with gardens at the moment!

(Photo by clshearin)

We’ve had an email from Daniel:

Can I recycle roofing felt? I have a lot of small pieces to get rid of.

I’ve not heard of it being recyclable and looking into it, it seems unlikely because it’s several hard/impossible to recycle materials all squished together.

The better option would be to use it up somehow. Small pieces can be used for various roofing projects in the garden – for example, on top of rabbit hutches or the like*, or really small pieces could be used for the roof of a covered bird table.

As always, if you can’t use it up/reuse it in that way, try offering the pieces on your local Freecycle/Freegle group — someone nearby may make hutches or bird tables and be able to include it in their work.

Any other suggestions for using up small pieces of roofing felt? Daniel doesn’t say how small is small but I’m imagining roll-ends and off-cuts, so nothing more than a few feet wide.

* it’s not recommended to use roofing felt on anything to do with chicken coops because it provides a perfect breeding ground for red mites – but our coop came with it on the nest box part and it’s actually the least red mite-y area in the coop. I wouldn’t include it if I was building a coop from scratch though.

I was going to write an article on different ways to reuse & recycle plastic carrier bags but then I started seeing such great pieces made from fusing the bags that I thought they deserved their own post — some really amazing stuff.

• I love, love, love Emily Grace and the Yellow Suitcase jewellery made from fused plastic bags and wire. Some of the pieces are delicate delights others bright & bold – but always beautiful.
• Sticking with jewellery, Raw Skies Studio make lovely flower brooches – pretty pansies and dramatic red roses.
• Moving into the more practical realm, there are some very nice strong fused plastic shopping bags & tote bags around – Radical Recycks makes some lovely ones. This Spongebob one is more of a handbag/purse but how fun!

• And to go in that bag, how about a fused plastic wallet? I really like the use of layered patterns on this wallet from Bece but equally the geometric shapes from kurbantrash (right) are very cool too.
• If you just need something for your cards, Ecoark make fused plastic credit card holders
• And following on from that, OfLandandSea combines fused plastic with strips of scrap fabric to make protective but cool passport protectors.

• But wait! Fused plastic fun isn’t just for grown-ups – how cute are these fused plastic bibs? And these mobiles would be pretty against a window in a nursery.
• Finally, I love the use of fused plastic and letters from different bags to protect and decorate this sketch book.

We all know to say “no” to carrier bags these days & use reusable ones instead – but in case you’ve got any of left over from before you saw the light… how to fuse together plastic bags. Rubbish Revamped in Manchester also run workshops on fusing plastic which are a great way to get started if you’re scared of melting plastic!

(Photo of a very pretty hairclip by EmilyGraceSuitcase; a bold & fun wallet by kurbantrash; and a cuter-than-cute bib by recyclemoe)

On the Suggest an Item page, Wendy recently explained:

We recently bought a new mattress after our Sleep Number bed (piece of junk, don’t get one) malfunctioned. We’ve saved the frame, which is made of black plastic and a lot of the cloth-like stuff that went around the air part. I was wondering if anyone had some nifty ideas for using this stuff. I am considering using the frame for raised beds or even a sand box.

If it’s how I’m imagining it, I’d make it into a raised bed — heck, I’d make just about anything into a raised bed at the moment. I get a bit obsessed about finding things I can grow stuff in at this time of year. If you already have enough bed space (you lucky duck!), it might be suitable to use as a frame for climbing plants – or if it’s light, you could cover it in clear plastic and make it into a giant cloche/row cover.

(Last time we asked about mattresses, someone posted a link to this radical recycling article – how to use every bit of an old spring mattress. It might be a bit too much for most people but I love the idea of a spring trellis.)

Any other suggestions? Any non-gardening ideas for people less obsessed than me? ;)