Storiel’s Museum collection has many examples of ‘recycling’.  Some are beautiful pieces made from treasured fragments, others discarded broken objects used in a new way.  Recycling makes use of scarce resources – left over cooking fat can be turned into rush lights, and torn faded dresses made into patchwork quilts.

In the past most material objects were used until they were worn out, sometimes by a succession of owners, or remade into other things.  Today recycling has become very important in a different way.  Our discarded waste, especially those things made from plastics and artificial fabrics, is threatening to overwhelm the world’s fragile ecosystem.