PVC pipes upcycled into a balance bike!

 

This is probably my biggest upcycling in terms of energy spent and thinking. It's not an easy upcycling when you start from scratch, but I'm hoping to guide you through the main step if you want to give yourself a try.
My model is largely inspired from the only one I found online made by Bruno Gavira.
But there's no tutorial available on how to make it.
So let's start from the begining. To make this balance bike, You need a 3 inch diameter PVC pipe that you need to cut using a coping saw.

Using a heat gun, it's fairly simple to slightly flatten the back of the frame by putting pressure with a piece of wood for few minutes.

At this point I realized that the wheel put to much pressure on the PVC and the plastic need to be reinforced by pieces of metal (found at the deck section at home depot) that I riveted (riveter cost 15$ and it's really useful to have one!)

For the fork, it just like playing Lego, nothing complicated, you just have to find elbow and T (3/4 inch diameter)

The only tricky part is to flatten the end of the fork using once again a heat gun (10$ by the way)

You just squeeze the end with a piece of wood once the plastic start being flexible (around 1 min with a heat gun) and wait around 1 min to get the temperature to cool down.
Heating PVC with a heat gun is probably not a safe idea and might release nasty molecules, so I recommend to do this step far away from your little ones.
The handle bar does not need any heating, just one more T connectors.

The mudguard is made from a 90 degres 4 inch connector and slighly shaped at the base with the heat gun. The strong connection is made with rivets.

 The saddle is made with a 3 inch pipe heated and shaped to fit the bottom of my little one by putting pressure with my feet.

The saddle is also riveted on the front and the back side.

 All the pipes needs to be secured with PVC cement.

 

I could not find old wheels so I bought some for 6$ each and used bolts and nuts to attach the wheels. I do not give all the details to build the bike, but the main steps are described.

Now let's have fun!!!!

Sculpting with piano parts...

Allen Christian's makes sculpture from everyday's life objects. Here is a set of sculptures made from piano parts:

 

His work is vsible now at the American Visionary Arts Museum in Baltimore titled “Human, Soul and the Machine: The Coming Singularity.”

Recycling/upcycling thrift store painting

I think this concept is based on a wonderful idea: adding monsters or funny characters to paintings that inspires no interest for most of us.
I must admit, you have to be gifted to do that, but at the end, this is a really fun project that could end up in kids bedroom instead of a trash.
This is some painting made by Chris Mc Mahon

 

A different style, made by Thyrza with prints available here on Etsy:

This is really inspiring, and I'm reading to go to thrift store and get my own painting to give it a try!

A fold-up pallet desk

One more shipping pallet project, but this one does not need any disassembling, only sanding, staining and adding a piece of plywood with hinges to make the desk. Very ingenious to save space.

Pallet Furniture at its best

This beautiful 2-seat sofa is really made of shipping pallet. This French design company Studio-aparte aspired for a new recycled pallet aesthetic that can match any contemporary interior. When painted in black, it's hard to guess what this sofa is made of.

For people who like to travel

Found at www.apartmenttherapy.com

PVC pipes used for water play!

Summer is coming, and here in Baltimore, we had a sample of the hot temperatures we might have later on. So I made this easy to make water play, to refresh our little ones when swimming pool is not an option.

This is really easy to make:

This is what you need to connect the pipes, pipes are 3/4 inch diameter. You need 3 stoppers, 2 T-shape, 2 elbows and one hose connection. For the pipes you choose whatever length you need. Most of the water play I have seen are kid-size, but this one is more than 6 feet tall. I have glued most of the pipes together except the 2 connections on the top to be able to store the structure in my basement.
To cut the pipes, you can use any little hand saw you want, it's really easy.

The most difficult part of the project was to find the connection from the hose to 3/4 inch PVC pipe. It must look like this and you can find it in the irrigation aisle:

To glue most of the pipes you have to use PVC primer and cement glue that you can find at the home depot or Lowes:

The top bar needs to have these special mister that will give you a very thin cloud of water, you can put as much as you want by drilling a hole (9/64) and then screwing them in.

And more importantly, kids love it!

Upcycled stools

These stools are found here made with pieces of hardwood. The pieces are tightened up with long bolts.
You can make your own stool by using long bolts used for building decks:

Or you decide to pay 500 euros for this original stool named "Bits of wood 2.0"

Upcycling naval mines.

Naval mines are probably the most unexpected upcyling you could think of.
This is made by an  Estonian artist named Mati Karmin who collects the mines left from world war II.

A Firelace:

A bathtub:

A chair:

A baby carriage:

With upcycled "toys" for the baby!!

Yellow pages upcycling

Once again, I got this Yellow Pages book an my front door... I don't understand why they spend so much money on something that is never used by most of us...
Kristiina lahde has a better solution, she makes sculptures out of these yellow pages, this is few pictures from her Hive serie:

© Kristiina Lahde

© Kristiina Lahde

Upcycling oil cans into ....electric guitars

The people selling these guitars at Bohemian Guitars were inspired from "the resourceful residents of the townships in South Africa who re-purpose materials into playable instruments".
A percentage of all guitar sales goes to donating instruments to schools and youth organizations.
Now they also have their own oil cans. It's a bit less eco friendly but I guess these vintage oil can might be hard to find and collect.

 Here is a video from Bohemian Guitars:

Upcycled Apple Jewelry...

You can find them here

and here