Cape Town - Business owner Galen McGee has flipped the saying: ’money does not grow on trees’ on its head.
As a way to give trees a new purpose, McGee uses wood from broken skateboards to create hand-crafted jewellery and pendants that stems straight from his heart.
With the use of his hands, McGee said the idea of the business started when he saw how he could give what people thought was useless, a way to reform and be useful again.
“I always wanted to do something with the broken skateboards, but I just couldn’t put my finger on it.
“Being someone who loves nature and helping the planet whether it would be by recycling or building with eco bricks, the idea of reusing the wood from the skateboards didn’t fall too far from the tree.
“A few days after the idea sparked in me, I found myself cutting out an Africa shape without any machinery, and it all made sense to why I needed to do what I did,” said McGee.
Expanding on how he turns broken skateboards into jewellery, he selects his chosen colour, as skateboards are separated by plies and they have different colours, and afterwards he selects a board, draws the diameters, and takes a manual saw to begin the process.
“After that we take sandpaper and we manually shape the rings till it is smooth and the shape is correct. Then we have to coat it in varnish which takes up to 10 coats on each side and once that is done we then have to polish it to make it have the final saucy look.
“All products that we craft are hand-crafted without tools, and given that we love what we do, it gives us the opportunity to understand how we contribute to lessen the chances of the woods being destroyed and becoming a pollutant to the environment we all share,” said McGee.
From forests and grasslands to rivers and oceans, communication manager at Greenpop, Carla Wessels said that the health and diversity of Earth’s ecosystems are the basis of human prosperity and well-being.
“Trees provide vital services to both people and the planet, bolstering livelihoods, providing clean air and water, conserving biodiversity and responding to climate change. They hold more than three-quarters of the world’s terrestrial biodiversity, provide many products and services that contribute to socio-economic development, and are a critical lifeline for hundreds of millions of people in rural areas, including many of the world’s poorest.
“With that being said, trees make life on this planet possible, and while it is wonderful to see so many businesses, such as Mr McGee’s, his efforts with re-purposing resources that would otherwise be discarded, reduces the pressure on our natural forests and helps preserve our ecosystems, contributing to the well-being of the human race,” said Wessels.
Combining his intention, vision and passion, McGee said that he will continue to push for what is right through his creation.
“I am most grateful for being given the talent and the knowledge to do what I do. Finding out what it was I needed to do with my life was a blessing, and I never take that for granted. I loved skateboarding, but at the same time I also love nature, so up-cycling skateboards just made me extremely happy and my heart full.”
“My advice to young people pursuing their dream would be to continue to do what they love because life is hard and running a business is tough, but happiness is where your strength comes from and that strength will be able to get you through anything life throws your way,” said McGee.
Weekend Argus