Summer 2011. I had all sorts of papers strewn across the kitchen counter....which in my tiny apartment serves as food prep, work area, and apparently also paper storage....when it dawned on me that I needed a cork board to organize the mess. But, of course, I didn't want a regular old, rectangular cork board. No, that would not do. How square. How silly a right angled board would look on my kitchen wall! So, I searched and searched for an odd shaped board. Long story short...I had to make one on my own.
My full wall birch tree cork board let to cork giraffes for a friend's baby room. Then I needed a jewelry organizer in my bathroom. And here I am today...still cutting and slicing through cork. And I would love to share this product with you.
I work in my teeny, tiny apartment which I share with my husband and two cats. We are surrounded by cork. Typically my cats assist me while I cut. I like to focus on creating minimal form through negative space...the balance of cutting just the right amount to create a structure without overstepping the limits of the material.
For some reason I have been unable to pinpoint, I have a love of cork. I love the sustainability of the material as well as its myriad of qualities....soft yet durable, forgiving and fire-resistant ?!? even anti-microbial and hypo-allergenic. It contains a substance called suberin that repels insects and fends off mites, germs, mold, and mildew. Not only can it be recycled, cork trees are never cut down to make cork products. Trees are not even damaged in any way that would obstruct the tree’s health - only the bark is removed and a new layer will eventually grow and be re-harvested in another 9 to 12 years. Now that's what I call green.
