Proving you can make beautiful jewelry out of trash is Gueto Studio, a jewelry design studio out of Brazil. They have gotten together with Brazil’s biggest petrol company, Petrobas to design products from recovered petroleum byproducts.
This jewelry line is made of rubber coming from the auto industry. Materials were selected that were not toxic to people who would be working with them manually.
Via Treehugger
An organization named Green Karat certifies gold as green or eco friendly. The make sure that gold was mined not under war, thru fair labor, and do as less harm to the environment as possible.
They do this by retraining miners into non-mining livelihoods, advocating for the recycling of precious metals. Most of it is sitting in bank vaults anyways! Gold mining is faulted with deforestation, soil erosion into streams. The industry uses chemicals, especially mercury to separate gold from rock. Its harms both its workers and the surrounding ecosystem as well.
They also oppose diamond mining because of the unconscionable human and ecological sacrifice as seen in the hit film “Blood Diamond” which stars Leonardo DiCaprio. As that movie showed the Diamond industry has financed the activities of various rebel groups who have practically enslaved, tortured, killed, and maimed miner workers, and their communities. (more…)
Verde Rocks designer, Gwendolyn Davis, has created a new line of vintage nouveau eco jewelry. Davis’ designs use only organic, vintage, recycled or any materials that can be certified sustainable. As she says:”Fashion does not have to be superficial. There is power in whatever one may have, and this industry is more influential than any other…”
You will not find the granola hippie look here. Verde rocks is elegant, sexy, and sophisticated. Its sustainable chic alright.
Beau Coco is a young online retailer of eco friendly and fair trade jewelry.
The first line is made from raw materials from the Pacific Island of Mauritius in the Central Indian Ocean. The designs are unique, and elegant, and very “earthy”. They include necklaces, bracelets, and earrings.
Bettina Bunce, the designer and owner of Beau Coco, personally went down to Mauritius to create the designs with the locals. Bettina established her background in fair trade before it became fashionable, working around the world for major organizations, including Oxfam.
The next group to work with Bettina will be women from the poorest slums of Delhi, India. The women collect and recycle plastic bags from the city dumps and Bettina is working with them to create a very contemporary range of jewelry to be launched in the autumn.
Support this eco friendly, fair trade jeweler.
