Don’t Throw It Out!

October 20, 2009 at 7:23 am | Posted in Tips | 18 Comments

Our friend David sends along this link to a recycled-paper craft idea from Greenprophet, a site covering environmental issues around the Middle East:

“With all of the colorful designs on a lot of junk mail catalogs and solicitations, many of them can make unique envelopes. They are extremely easy to make, and these one-of-a-kind, funky envelopes are sure to put a smile on your addressee’s (and maybe even your postman’s) face.

For this project you will need:

1 sheet of junk mail paper or 1 sheet out of a junk mail catalog

Scissors

Glue

Card/Letter you want to put in the envelope

1. Place the item you want to mail (the card or letter) on the center of your junk mail sheet. Make sure that the side of the paper you want to appear as the outside of the envelope is facing down.

2. Fold the sides of the sheet in around the card or letter – fold straight creases along the top, bottom, left, and right. This should create a grid-like pattern of folds on the sheet. (See the picture on the right.)

3. Use your scissors to cut out the four corners that were created by the folds. This should leave you with a cross-like shaped paper that has a center for the card or letter you want to mail and 4 flaps surrounding it. (Check out the picture on the left.)

4. Glue one of the larger flaps to the two side flaps to create a pocket for the item you want to mail. Once the glue has dried, place your letter in and seal the envelope by gluing the remaining flap closed.

If you are hand-delivering this envelope, then you don’t have to worry how sturdy your paper is. But if you plan on mailing the envelope (especially if it’s to an international location), then you may want to line the inside of the envelope with some additional junk mail paper. Magazine or catalog papers can be beautiful, but they can also be thin so before gluing the flaps closed in step 4, glue a cut out piece of paper that is slightly smaller than the main section of the envelope to the inside.”