Chef Nora Pouillon opened Nora, a restaurant featuring organic food, in Washington, DC in 1979.  In 1999, Nora became the first certified organic restaurant in the U.S. and was voted one of the "Top 10 Healthiest Restaurants" by Health magazine. Nora has a holistic approach to cooking: don't waste anything, use everything. She collects vegetable trimmings in a large plastic bag and stores them in the freezer until she has at least 4 cups to make stock. Nora similarly stores chicken and beef bones in her freezer for stock. She composts spoiled trimmings to grow organic herbs and vegetables for her garden.

Nora's Recipe for Great Soup Stock Add 8-10 cups of water, salt, pepper and herbs to the vegetable trimmings. Bring to a boil. Simmer for 1/2 hour for vegetarian stock.  If you add chicken or beef bones, simmer the stock slowly for 1-1/2 to 2 hours to extract their flavor.

Sandals from old tires have been a tradition in South Africa, Latin America and the Sub-Sahara for generations. In the 60s, hippies in the U.S. sported footwear from old tires.

But in 1995, two enterprising 25-year old entrepreneurs (one American studying computer programming and a Kenyan social worker) transformed the sandals from traditional to trendy. And they created a sandal-making business to give residents in a poor section of Nairobi an opportunity to support themselves.

The two entrepreneurs worked with five young sandal makers who could not afford to attend school. Working together, the entrepreneurs and sandal makers experimented with designs, established strict quality control standards, and then began marketing the sandals in Kenya.

In 2000, Matt Meyer, the American entrepreneur, set up a website and offered the sandals to 500 of his friends and relatives in the U.S. 

Sandal-maker Kyalo

Meyer's friends told others about the sandals. Demand grew and so did the business. Now the Nairobi factory has 27 sandal makers and 4 administrators.  The factory employees receive a salary and 30% of all profits. 

Ten volunteers, who work outside of Kenya, help market and process orders. These volunteers are not paid; they are gratified to see the lives of the Kenyan sandal-makers improve.

Michael Karuri, 20, is one of the Kenyan sandal makers who has benefited from the sandal business. Before he became involved with the sandal business, he could only afford one meal a day. Now he earns ten times what he earned previously. His earnings pay for his little sister's schooling. Karuri travels abroad for business training and has begun to market the sandals for the company. 

These sandals, available in 11 styles, are made from used tires, glue, leather and thread.

Patti Sandal	Mumbi Sandal	La'alo Sandal

Some are decorated with beading and cowrie shells. The sandals come in both men and women's sizes. The comfortable and trendy sandals are ideal for wearing at the beach, walking in town, or as shower shoes.

The sandals are not sold in stores. They can only be ordered on the web: http://www.ecosandals.com   Allow two-four weeks for delivery.

Can you ever have too many tote bags? Not if they are innovative, fun and beautiful. Why tote your paper and personal items in the mundane, when you can carry all in a fashion statement or conversation piece?

Mikan Silk Bag

Silk Bags with an Asian Influence
Yafah Franco learned how to design and stitch beautiful clothing and accessories from her grandmother, a professional seamstress.  When Yafah needed a bag in a hurry, she immediately made one from an old silk obi. Her obi bag collected compliments and a few requests for ones like it. So Yafah pulled a vintage silk kimono from her closet and stitched a few more. As demand increased, Yafah started Mikan Handbags. Each silk bag is fully lined and hand finished.

Bags from Newsprint

Tote bag from NY Times Ad.

Maria Capotorto is both a graphic and industrial designer and enjoys experimenting with new materials. While "messing around with materials at home" she developed a technique for bonding newspapers to one another and then laminating them.  Maria fashioned the bonded newspapers into tote bags and created Your Sister's Mustache, to produce them.

Her tote bags--created from newspapers, magazines and maps-- hold 20 lbs and will last for a year when used every day.  For ordering information, visit Your Sister's Mustache.

Bags from Billboards

Billboard Bag

While working for a large cosmetic company, Joni Johnson developed a line of giftware from recycled materials.

The company decided not to produce the new gifts she'd developed. But Joni had fallen in love from a line of bags made from billboards. So, she started a company, Relan, and began producing the bags. Now they are sold throughout the United States.  For ordering information, visit Found Objects.

For Handypeople:
The Eze Nail Puller ™

David Hext, of the U.K., wrote to us recommending "a brilliant tool from the U.S. for pulling out nails with minimal damage to the wood." He said that this tool makes recycling pallets and other scrap wood much easier and results in a higher recovery rate. "I have just lifted 4 square yards of flooring with no serious damage to the boards and been able to relay all of them."

You can find the Eze Nail Puller ™ at: www.collins-tools.com/nailpuller.htm.

For Sewers: Adding Zing to Your Wardrobe

In her book, "Cheap Frills: Fabulous Facelifts for Your Clothes" designer Jennifer Knapp offers great ideas for updating clothes, which require a modest outlay of time and money. Saddled with dull t-shirts, worse-for-wear vintage sweaters and abused jeans (among other things)? Knapp shows how to turn them into fashion statements. There are also instructions for whipping up bags, stoles, hair doodads and for dressing up slide shoes.

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