Sustainability
At Nature's Inspiration I am extremely passionate about protecting our environment and being as sustainable as I possibly can be. I believe in ethically sourced materials and providing great quality products and service whilst not damaging the environment. All packaging used is carefully chosen and my business cards are printed on wildflower seed paper - a gift of nature from me to you! I hand deliver locally within a radius of 5 miles and you can find me in various stockists and markets in and around the county.
From a young age I was very much a lover of the great outdoors and nature. From learning about hand pressing flowers and growing sunflowers in the family garden to local wildflowers this kept me entertained and interested in nature. From hand feeding Peacocks and caring for wildlife including being passionate about saving endangered animals being a young member of the WWF and embarking upon annual sponsored walks at my local hill to raise money to help save Pandas.
I hand press, forage as locally as possible whilst following the countryside code and foraging sustainably not impacting on the environment. I've actually got some incredible Darwin's Barberry close to my house which flower pretty much all year and enable me to keep up stock of orange small flowers perfect for resin jewellery making. I absolutely love watching these change through the seasons and producing the most spectacular leaves in autumn - colours of the rainbow. All flowers/botanicals are hand dried, pressed, dried in silica by me.
I also only work with vegan non-toxic resin produced by a UK company as I believe this is extremely important to support small businesses and this incredible resin confirms to non-toxic UK standards. The company is run by two sisters who also are passionate about growing and looking after the environment. All pigments are sourced and hand=made locally within the Cotswolds by a fabulous small business owner. They are extremely high pigmented, incredible to work with and are around an 8/9 on the Blue Wool scale which is exceptional. Again another likeminded small business passionate for crafting and maintaining our natural environment.
So what packaging do I use? I use biodegradable posting bags when the weather is a little unpredictable and FSC approved (already recycled from responsible sources) Kraft cardboard large letter boxes, paper tape, tissue paper, shredded brown packing paper (recycled) and branded stickers which are made from 100% recycled materials and are 100% recyclable. At markets and most of my stockists will also use the brown kraft bags.
I can also provide a gift wrap service where I send directly to the recipient with a note. I tend to use jute bags or burlap for this.
As I mentioned my business cards are printed on wildflower seed paper by me on ethically sourced wildflower seeded paper and non toxic inks. When I purchase the card a tree is planted also and I used white thin card for distribution which I encourage to be recycled or I direct people to my sign with a QR code which takes you to my website and then in turn socials minimising waste where possible.
What do I do with any left over resin? I collect drips and extra's in a pot then create something special. I endeavour to measure to what I need to avoid waste and stop the resin entering the water system by using plastic free biodegradable baby wipes to clean and disposing of these in an appropriate way. I protect my hands when working with resin by wearing nitrile gloves which I reuse as much as possible. I am still yet to find fully reusable ones which are small enough to fit my hands and allow me to work in detail.
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For anyone who attends a workshop with me, you'll note that I encourage you to pour only what you need and we always work with a zero waste option to decant any unused resin into as there are times it isn't always possible to measure correctly. On beach workshops we ask if any others within the class need certain colours to avoid waste and incorporate any leftover treasures back into our makes.
By shopping with a small business you are helping to protect the environment, purchase something unique and making a small business owner and artist extremely grateful.
Thank you for shopping small with Nature's Inspiration and spreading the joy of nature.
Emma x
