[Guest]

<strong>Written By:</strong> Anonymous
<strong>Date:</strong> 2006-01-10 14:27:00
<a href="/article/82755969-from-bags-to-riches-recycled-plastic-for-boutiques-of-london-and-ny">Article Link</a>

It is all the result of an environmental and development project dreamed up four years ago by an Indian couple, Shalabh and Anita Ahuja, who run their own non-governmental organisation (NGO), Conserve. But they admit they never dreamed that what was envisaged as a small-scale project for a single slum would turn into such a profitable enterprise, exporting all over the world and with an annual turnover of about £100,000.

"People tell us it's so successful we should turn it into a business, but we don't want to," says Ms Ahuja. "Development was the father and mother of this project. When you start something like this you make a lot of promises. And we feel we have to fulfil our obligations." Every penny Conserve makes is ploughed back into the organisation's development work in India and Ms Ahuja thinks that is part of the bags' appeal. "The fact that we're a non-profit-making organisation has made us a brand internationally," she says. "That's part of what makes people want to buy the bags."

Native by Native, which sells the bags in the UK, promotes them on its website as environmentally friendly. The India Shop, another UK supplier, even carries a picture of the waste bags the handbags are made of on its website, and promotes them as "addressing environmental and social issues".

However, there have been no compromises on quality. To look at Conserve's handbags, you would never imagine they were made from recycled plastic bags. At first sight, they look like leather; it is only on touching the bags you realise they are made of plastic at all - and even then it is thick, high-quality plastic.

Since it's the first of its kind, the project has developed its own rules on quality control. The bags use colourful designs, but Ms Ahuja has a strict rule that no dyes are allowed. The colours are all the original colours of the plastic bags used in making the handbags. Pieces of different coloured plastic bags are carefully stitched together to make the patterns, then they are heat-pressed to form what appears to be a single sheet of plastic.

<a href="http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia/article337557.ece">http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia/article337557.ece</a>

[Guest]

I love this story of how someone can take an item that is somewhat useless to others and create a work of art and resell it . I went to an artshow where this woman had created art out of bubble wrap , it was actually beautifully created too .
Great story !