In my family, I am famous for recycling. No cardboard box that ever passed my path and lived to tell the tale. Since furniture is so pricey now a days that you need to sell the house to buy a wardrobe, my family doesn’t complain when I steal their cardboard boxes to build racks and other storage areas.
I started when my child was two by building a Playhouse out of the cardboard box that once covered our new fridge.
Next year, I repapered it in bright pink and it became the famous Playschool where my daughter scribbled her famous first word–ZYXWVUTSRQPONMLKJIHGFEDCBA–several times over. She had also created her first fish (without fins), first caterpillar, first cat with two legs and her brood of kittens lacking in limbs at various degrees, playing with a limbless monkey. You can see them on my previous post about minimalistic approach to painting.
Later the building was used as a stable where her rocking horse was housed.
After that I created a couple of shoe racks (that are not worth seeing anymore because they couldn’t take the weight of the shoes).
A couple of years back I created what you can loosely call as the dresser cabinet (top). And last year when my daughter started school and her books were everywhere, I built her a bookshelf (bottom).
Initially it was sky blue, but my daughter took it in her hands to bring more colour to it and the result was…well, I should have just taken the picture and shared it with you. Let’s just say she went a little overboard with the sketch pens. She wouldn’t let me change the paper for how attached she was to that scribble. So, I had to wait an entire year until the paper was a little torn in the corners to get her permission to ‘take down her masterpiece’. Now, it is a sunny yellow, and I added lace, so she is satisfied that it is nice enough to be hers for now.
However, she has been threatening me with colours ever since. I have requested her to wait until I have acquired Acrylics so the painting is “even nicer with all the shiny shades”. It will give the poor thing another month or so before it becomes her next victim and I have to find another excuse to repaper it.
Since we are moving house soon and buying loads of new things, there will be loads of cardboard to go by. So, I am planning more recycled stuff–paintings, wall hangings, shelfs, one privacy wall for my office work and other tidbits to add to our living space while avoiding cutting down any trees.
Wish me luck!
Short Stories | Fish-eye Perspective 