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The word 'reclaimed' seems like one of those environmentally fashionable buzzwords that people use alongside 'reduce', 'reuse' and 'recycle'. But reclaimed pine furniture isn't just about projecting a shabby-chic image. It's also about responsible buying - saving the wastage of millions of tonnes of timber that could otherwise be reclaimed and reducing the need for unethical logging companies around the world to tear down more forests to fill cheap consumer oak furniture trends. So, buying reclaimed furniture can make you look classy and still save the planet all at the same time!
With the global environmental consequences of deforestation, more and more people are thinking about buying furniture made from reclaimed timber. Reclaimed furniture is aesthetically very appealing and its popularity has grown rapidly as eco-conscious customers have invested in sustainability by buying bespoke reclaimed furniture. In the United Kingdom, there are a growing number of manufacturers that are making beautiful new bespoke furniture from reclaimed wood.
In the vast forests of South America, Russia and China, unregulated logging is taking place on an unprecedented scale. Whole areas of dense beautiful forests are being destroyed, and the habit for woodland creatures decimated as greedy logging companies leave the land barren and bleak in order to create cheap, mass produced furniture.
Just under half of the Earth's land surface was once covered with lush, green forests. These days, about fifty percent of the world's forests are gone and wood consumption is increasing at a rate that could deforest the final untouched woodlands of the world before 2040.
People in the UK waste an awful lot of wood. Although there is an absence of accurate data as for the total, but figures indicate that around four and a half million tonnes of timber is wasted each year, left to rot in landfills or burnt. The best way to prevent this terrible waste is to re-use the timber. Approximately one and a half million tonnes of waste timber is reclaimable.
At present, in the UK, when old buildings are demolished, the wood is saved to sell within the increasing market for reclaimed timber beams, floorboards and shelves. In the UK, the Directory of Reclaimed Furniture Suppliers exists to promote companies that sell furniture that has been made from old timber. The idea behind the directory is to ensure that customers that want to find this type of furniture have access to it and don't have to go too far to locate it. The directory doesn't make any claims about the quality of the company or its products, but customers can always form their own opinions about the quality of reclaimed materials when they visit the companies.
Illegal logging is an industry worth billions of pounds, by purchasing reclaimed wood products; you can decrease the demand for new wood, prevent the waste of millions of tonnes of used wood and impress everyone with your stylish reclaimed timber furniture. |
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