Glyndwr Students Make Jewellery From Recycled Wood

Leftover timber from a North Wales wood manufacturer has been recycled by Glyndŵr University students to make jewellery and to fire kilns to make pottery.

The university’s North Wales School of Art and Design (NWSAD) has taken delivery of £200 worth of wood from Inwood (Cymru) Ltd, based on Cefndy Road, Rhyl.

Large blocks of wood will be used by students at NWSAD on Regent Street, while smaller splints and off cuts will be recycled into kilns which are used to create pottery artwork.

Cerys Alonso, senior lecturer in applied arts, said: “We were delighted when Inwood approached us about taking some wood off them.

“We’re always in need of raw materials to aid students’ creativity and develop their talents as artists so we’re very thankful to them for the donation.”

Inwood director Jon Culshaw, who runs the firm with his dad Bill, said they came up with the idea to donate wood to the education sector a few years ago when they were based in Greenfield.

“We’ve been amazed at how wood which is no longer of use to us has been so beneficial to schools,” said Jon. “Pupils at Denbigh High School, for example, have used it to make everything from bird tables to computer desks and even a speaker system.

“If you’re a big company with 200 plus people working for you you’d probably have a timber skip which gets filled and then taken away to be recycled into MDF or chipboard. But we’re only a small company and just don’t produce that kind of volume from the work so this was an alternative solution we came up with to recycle the wood which we had leftover.

“We’re members of the British Woodworking Federation who are championing sustainability and have spoken to us about rolling the scheme out to schools and colleges nationwide. Hopefully something will come of that but for now, we’re happy to hear from anyone in North Wales who think they can make use of the surplus wood which we have.”

Information and photos from the company’s work with North Wales schools to date are on the website www.woodworkersuk.co.uk and on Facebook, facebook.com/gateexpectations.

Inwood is keen to hear from other woodworkers interested in supplying schools with free wood in order to meet growing demand.