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Beauty and the Beasts: Artists Make Jewels from Junk to Save Marine Animals
Green Technology Featured Articles
September 19, 2013

Beauty and the Beasts: Artists Make Jewels from Junk to Save Marine Animals

By Cheryl Kaften
TMCnet Contributor

Today, there’s a way to turn your environmental guilt into the guilty pleasure of wearable art—high-end jewelry that is appearing on modeling catwalks worldwide.

Through a four-year-old global movement started by Chilean-born artist Tatiana Pagès at her New York City-based business, Greencard Creative, designers are being encouraged to take plastic six-pack packaging – which otherwise would end up in the ocean as floating debris – and use it to create outrageously beautiful necklaces and ornaments.


The movement is called Origomu, which is comes from the Japanese “ori,” meaning “folding,” and  “gomu,” meaning “rubber”—to represent practice of  “folding plastic.”

The Motivation

From the Equator to the Polar Regions, from Indonesia to Mexico, the world's oceans are contaminated today by an estimated 46,000 pieces of floating plastic litter that have the potential to harm millions of sea birds and marine animals. At least 267 different species are known to have suffered from entanglement or ingestion of aquatic debris—including seabirds, turtles, seals, sea lions, whales and fish.

Already, activists have taken up the cause, urging:

  • Environmentalists around the world to cut the plastic rings before disposing of them,
  • International legislations to prevent shipping companies from dumping plastic at sea,
  • Costly beach and seabed clean-up operations, and
  • Public awareness campaigns.
  • These measures have not been successful in eradicating the problem.

The Movement

“Change your world with your own hands” is the motto of Origomu—and the contrast between the dreadful and dangerous plastic packaging and the dazzling and delicate final results is very much symbolic of the artist’s credo. 


Above, plastic transformed into a gorgeous necklace by Jennifer Lau of New York City. (Photo courtesy of Origomu.)

The Origomu technique is explained on the Greencard Creative website and at in-person, hands-on workshops that have been taught by Pagès, herself, as well as at Pratt Institute in New York City. Recently, Pagès organized an international Origomu design competition—and was surprised to receive jewelry from 25 participating countries, among them,  Belgium, Chile, Ecaudor, India, Mexico, New Zealand, Switzerland, and the United States.

The sophisticated designs—more than 500 have been created to date—have been recognized by the fashion industry and the art world, with collections shown at the Eco-Fashion Exhibit at the Museum of the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) in New York, at the Cirque Du Soleil Ecological Tent in Montreal, and by the Punta Cana Foundation in the Dominican Republic.

And artistic ability is not a requirement for participation. Pagès constantly is recruiting new activists—from stores, bodegas, schools, supermarkets, restaurants, and distributors—to send in their plastic rings before they hit the dumpsters, landfills, and oceans. To date, she has collected more than 1.1 million to be recycled into fashion accessories.

More than just another artist using reclaimed materials, Pagés says she wants Origomu to become a global community dedicated to cleaning up plastic pollution. “Origomu is a demonstration of the extraordinary potential we all have to transform by hand the ugliness of industrial waste into the exquisite beauty of a unique piece,” writes the designer. “From art exhibits to a design contest, Origomu has inspired art and design communities worldwide.”




Edited by Alisen Downey


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