Environment / Furniture
The Boxing Day furniture sale alternative
Boxing day is synonymous with those furniture sale adverts and people bouncing on new sofas, but what happens to the old ones and do you need to be heading to an out-of-town- department store this year?
Nicci Peck, CEO of the SOFA Project, recommends trying a local charity, social enterprise or a reclaimation yard before buying new furniture. “It’s amazing what you find,” she says. “People walk into our Gloucester Road store and don’t realise it’s a charity shop.”
SOFA Project has furniture at a range of prices including good quality sofas for just £10. They also sell new furniture which only has the packaging damaged.
is needed now More than ever
Second-hand furniture at the SOFA project on Gloucester Road
When replacing a sofa and disposing of the old one, both Bristol Waste and the SOFA Project advocate that Bristol’s household waste and recycling centres (HWRC’s) in St Phillip’s and Avonmouth should be the last resort as it means landfill for sofas, because they are made of a mixture of materials.
Wooden furniture will get recycled into wood chips, to make more wood (e.g. OSB) or burnt to generate power. Which if something isn’t broken doesn’t make sense. Bristol Waste did have a furniture reuse sale in June and are planning one for spring 2019, where wooden tables (kitchen, coffee, side), chairs and stools, chests of drawers etc are resold for under £40, and the money donated to the Bristol Reuse Network.
Although, instead of taking furniture to the HWRC’s Joanna Dainton, Bristol Waste’s reuse co-ordinator, highlights the many online forums, including the Freecycle Network, Freegle, Gumtree and eBay, that can be used to resell or give away old furniture. Charity shops will also often collect furniture for free.
All the wooden furniture for sale at the Bristol Waste Reuse event in June 2018
Charity shops can only take sofas with fire safety labels so don’t ever cut them out. At SOFA Project, reuse and upcycling is the priority so even if a sofa is missing a cushion they will mix and match sofa cushions, and for ones that can’t be resold they will give cushions to the Scrapstore for their Playpods or the cats and dogs home.
If you are planning some DIY over the Christmas holiday then consider browsing the selection of paint available for £2 a litre through the Community RePaint Network. These second-hand pots of paint are dropped off by residents or salvaged from local recycling centres, and are available at Re:work in Knowle and SOFA Project in Old Market.
The Community Repaint initiative offers pots of paint at £2 a litre
With the abundance of alternatives to buying new in Bristol, how else can you spend your Boxing Day than heading to the sales?
Read about the realities of throwaway fast fashion here: b247.staging.proword.press/lifestyle/environment/throwaway-fashion
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