Using Green Glass - Keep It Out of the Landfills!
Wine Bottle Raised Bed
Repurpose Wine Bottles
It's sad but true that green glass, such as wine bottles, is not recycled. So, millions of green glass bottles end up in a land fill. So, I decided to try to find ways to repurpose them and have several creative ways to reuse them.
CREATE ART: A friend of mine makes beautiful decorative items by drilling a small hold near the bottom of the bottle. She inserts a string of tiny Christmas tree lights into the bottle. Next she paints designs on the bottle using acrylic paint. Grapes, leaves, flowers, holiday designs, flowerts, martini glasses, etc. decorate her bottles. She embelishes them with glass beads or sparkly items and applies a glass knob or crystal to the cork. After she is finished, she plugs it in and the tiny lights glow inside the bottle. These make wonderful items to brighten a kitchen corner or a bar.
Use a bottle cutter and cut the bottle into slices, or rings, and hang them from a piece of driftwood or bar and create a wind chime or mobile.
LAMPS: Lamps can be made from empty wine bottles as well. Buy a lamp part kit and drill a hole near the base of the bottle and assemble according to the directions. Fill the bottle with pebbles or glass beads or drops to add weight to the lamp won't tip over easily. Add a bulb and a shade and you have a unique lamp.
My friend sells these items at wine shops, gourmet shops, art galleries and online.
RAISED GARDEN BEDS: I read a memoir of a man who spent time in a leper colony. A soft drink company would deliver soda to the colony and leave the empty bottles, normally returned and resued, lest their customers worry that the bottles being refilled my carry the disease. The patients found novel uses for the hundreds of empty green glass soda bottles by making them into salt and pepper shakers, surgar dispensers and most uniqe of all, raised garden beds. They pushed the neck of the bottle into the soil and formed a circle, they filled the circle with compost and fertile soil and grew veggies and flowers inside the ring.
VASES AND PLANTERS: Purchase a bottle cutting kit at a craft store, cut the neckf your empty wine bottle, sand the sharp edges smooth and use the bottom of the bottle for planting herbs and place them on a sunny windowsill. Or cut the top off and use the remaining bottle as a vase.
BE CREATIVE - I hope you are inspired to come up with other ways to reuse green or blue wine bottles and if you do, please share the ideas with others (and me, please).
