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I’m super excited about this week’s Etsy Adore feature for Rewined Recycled Glassware. I recently purchased a set of these myself so I’m happy to be able to bring them in as a giveaway! Let’s hear from Zeke about his shop.

Tell us a little about you and your shop.
My name is Zeke and I am the proprietor of the etsy site ‘bodhicitta‘. I make REWINED RECYCLED GLASSWARE: utilitarian glassware made from recycled wine bottles. March 7th was my one year anniversary on Etsy. I have been working with glass in different forms at various levels for 10 years. I have a day job making custom stained glass windows and I also do flame working in addition to making the recycled glasses (one cannot have enough glass in their life!). I live by myself with a couple of houseplants I manage to keep alive in a just-the-right-sized house in Greensboro, NC. I moved here in 2007 to be closer to my son, Marley (who then moved to California ) I am lucky to have some great friends who take good care of me. Everybody asks what ‘bodhicitta’ means and in a nutshell it means ‘having the mind of loving-kindness’. Living life with an awareness and intention to be kind.

How did you get into working with glass?
Ever since high school I have been fascinated with glass, especially glass bottles. It’s hard to explain but I am mesmerized with the fact that glass can be manipulated by fire and changed into so many different useful things with out ever losing it’s quality. To me it’s a magical substance. Primal forces like fire, time and gravity are the tools used to work glass and there are days when you are in tune with all these and you feel in tune with some deeper fundamental power. Glass is my siren song and so I have been drawn to any opportunity to be involved with it. And I have been lucky those opportunities seem to have manifested providentially; from learning flame working in Atlanta to stained glass here in Greensboro.

When did you first see the potential in recycling glass bottles?
On a practical level-we cannot as a community of life continue to make 28 billion bottles a year and throw “away” 66% of them. It is simply unsustainable and will ruin this planet for future generations if we don’t take some responsibility and change our behavior. When I started reading glass recycling statistics I knew there was something I could do to help. My glassblowing mentor and friend Mike Kennedy has been making these for decades and he showed me how.

On a more philosophical and spiritual level, I feel like I am living out this metaphor, or this hard wired myth that my life seems to follow. It is the redemption story. The story of the underdog comeback. The phoenix rising from the ashes. In my teens and twenties I miserably failed as a human being. I was selfish, ignorant, and filled with hate. I was destructive and made the lives of those around me miserable. Luckily I ended up in prison. There I finally admitted I didn’t know how to live, and I had a lot of time to try and figure it out. I went on a deep intellectual and spiritual quest for wisdom. One of the fruits of which was a simple understanding that we are all interconnected. What I do affects the whole; my actions, positive and negative, ripple out like waves when a pebble is tossed into still water. It’s a big circle, a cycle, Karma. I learned I had a responsibility to choose what pebbles to toss, and like it or not we are tossing pebbles all day everyday. I needed to be part of the solution. That’s where bottles come in. They are the perfect extension of my inner life. Here is something people take for granted. They use it and toss it away and never think twice about it. But these bottles still have value and usefulness. With a little love and a little effort these bottles can be given a beautiful second life. People sometimes are like bottles.

The bottles you use aren’t the only thing recycled, your packaging is as well, right?
I am a dumpster diving addict! It really is hard for me to drive past a dumpster full of all sorts of things that I see as still very useful. I ship all my glasses in boxes I reclaim from the dumpsters or collect from local businesses. The Green Bean Coffee house has been a great source of boxes and newspapers which I shred to use as cushion for the glasses. I also use recycled gift packaging that I hand stamp with “Rewined Recycled Glassware” then use real wine to put on a wine glass stain. I also get lots of stuff at the thrift stores. My work desk and storage systems (file cabinet) are thrift store scores!

What is your current favorite item in shop?
It changes. It usually is one of the newer things I am working on. So currently it is the stemless wine glasses with an etched map of the world on it. When I think of it, I always hear the song “He’s got the whole world in his hands” in my head and I smile…you can have the whole world in your hand too!

Name three favorite shops.
www.ecoeveryday.etsy.com My friend Betsy makes the BEST eco friendly laundry soap and she is just an awesome person!
www.witchhazelhandmades.etsy.com Another friend of mine Justi is the crafters crafter. Even if the world would go to pieces she would be crafting something! I respect that.
www.ifop.etsy.com The little friends of printmaking make the coolest prints! I am in love with good affordable art and these crazy kids from Wisconsin got it goin’ on!

Zeke and Rewined Recycled Glassware are teaming up with us at Oh How Lovely Shops to give a mixed set of stemless wine glasses. Now I can attest to how amazing these are so this is definitely a giveaway you want to make sure you take part in!

To enter:

Go to Rewined Recycled Glassware and take a look around.

Pick out your favorite item.

Come back here and comment with the name or link to your favorite item.

To get extra entries: blog or twitter about this contest and leave a link to it in a separate comment.

Anyone with a valid email address can enter. You don’t have to have a blog.

The winners will be chosen using the integer generator on random.org and notified via email.

Get your entries in by Sunday, March 22nd at 11:59PM and you’re in!

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