Sourcing My Materials

If you have read my about page, you’ll notice that all of the handmade items in my Etsy shop are made using discarded materials. You might be wondering what exactly that means. Well this post is for you!
 
What I consider to be discarded material:

• Items that are damaged – Clothing, curtains, and materials with stains, holes, or permanent creases that can be salvaged and cut around.
• Headed for the trash – Sometimes new, undamaged, whole materials get thrown away. You would be surprised.
• Secondhand items – There are many times when someone buys new materials, and it sits around for years gathering dust. Then when spring-cleaning comes, the buyer decides it is taking up too much space, and it needs to go.
• Scraps – sometimes you (or I, or a company) buys a material for a certain project, and when you are done, you likely have a certain amount leftover that might seem unusable for your purposes.
• “Seconds” – these are new materials that for some reason do not fit with the manufacturer’s standards and cannot be sold to their customers. It may be fabric that isn’t the exact right color, or it could be that the grain is skewed.

 
 
Why I use Discarded Materials:

• I used discarded materials because I truly believe that they can be made into beautiful, functional products. I am one of those people who hates to see anything go to waste, especially when it doesn’t have to be.  So I intercept the waste and puzzle out ways to use it to create products that someone will love.

 
 
Where I get them:

• Garage sales
• Thrift stores
• Donations from friends and family
• Local workrooms and factories
• Hand me downs
• Websites that sell seconds

 
 
How this affects my products and pricing:

• My products are often one of a kind. I may only have enough discarded material to make one!
• My material costs can vary quite a bit. Some of my materials are free, some are expensive, and they can be anywhere in-between. Each time I make a product out of a different material, the price reflects that specific cost of materials.
• Having one of a kind products means that I spend more time photographing and listing my products on Etsy than someone who is selling the same thing repeatedly. I cannot always reuse my photos or description if the materials change. This also is reflected in how I price things, because each of these things takes time.

 
 
Who benefits:

• YOU benefit because you can be proud of your purchase knowing that it is responsibly sourced and made.
• MY SOURCES benefit. Supporting thrift stores and garage sales helps ensure that people continue to resell their discarded possessions instead of trashing them. And my local workroom? They love knowing that the fabric they can’t use is going to be used by someone else instead of being thrown out.
• THE EARTH benefits because there is less trash going to landfills.
• I (MADELINE STAGE) benefit greatly. It never gets old. Using discarded materials is one of the really challenging and also rewarding parts of my business. It is often very limiting to my work. I usually have to work around not having enough of one fabric or material and knowing that I will likely never be able to get more. But this limiting can be a good thing! Often it’s our limits that force us to be more resourceful and creative.

I turn these scraps into headbands!