Skip to main content

Would you buy a pair of shoes made from coffee waste?


When life gives you coffee beans, make sneakers.

Helsinki-based Vietnamese designers Son Chu and Jesse Tran have managed to create high-quality shoes made of used coffee grounds and recycled plastic. The company, called Rens Original, says the kicks are waterproof, light, durable and odor-resistant.

A pair of these unisex slip-ons weighs about 460 grams – 300 grams of that is coffee. The equivalent of six discarded plastic bottles is also used in each pair. They're made by infusing the used coffee grounds with the plastic bottle pellets. Once infused, this material is then spun into a polymer yarn where it is then knitted onto a waterproof membrane.

So if you want to help the environment while shopping for fashionable kicks, perhaps Rens is perfect for you.



Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Check out this insane music box powered by 2,000 marbles

The brainchild of Swedish musician Martin Molin, the Wintergartan Marble Machine , is a bizarre music box that allows the user to play tunes using a hand crank and 2,000 steel marbles. The Rube Goldberg'esque contraption features a vibraphone, bass, drums, cymbals and other instruments that play a score programmed into a 32 bar loop comprised of LEGO Technic parts. It's mesmerizing, and you can watch how they built it over here . [h/t: MailOnline ]

Hirotoshi Ito creates creepy, yet enchanting stone sculptures

When I found Hirotoshi Ito's flickr stream about four years ago, my eyes widened and my jaw dropped. I've come across some amazing sculptures before, but Hirotoshi's work is one of the most memorable I've seen.  The Japanese artist, also known as Jiyuseki, takes ordinary rocks found in a river bank near his home and adds his own bit of weird and funny alterations. He usually spends up to a month carving and decorating each of his stone pieces. As he chisels, Hirotoshi retains the original shape of the rock, then he adds accessories such as zippers, dentures, coins and other materials to complete the illusion. His creations are somewhat creepy, but they also bring laughs and smiles to the people who see them. You can learn more about Hirotoshi and his work on his  website .

Irene Saputra's Colorful Stitched Pieces

Embroidery is nowhere near forgotten, and in fact, it's experiencing something of a resurgence as artists around the globe are putting their own unique spins on the craft. Indonesia's Irene Saputra is one of them, and more than 45,000 people on Instagram already follow her.  Handmade from colorful threads stitched onto fabric, Irene's embroideries begin as original illustrations. What I really like about her stitched pieces is that some of them are meant to be worn. Look at an array of her handiwork!