Shal­iza Has­sanali

Re­tired so­cial work­er Su­san Thomas is one of T&T's suc­cess­ful en­tre­pre­neurs who con­verts re­cy­cled pa­per in­to ex­quis­ite, hand-craft­ed beads that can be used to make jew­el­ry. Not on­ly is Thomas a mas­ter pa­per jew­el­er, she al­so man­u­fac­tures jour­nals, per­son­alised greet­ings cards and sheets of pa­per, us­ing skele­tonised leaves and re­cy­cled pa­per. De­scrib­ing her­self as en­vi­ron­men­tal­ly con­science, Thomas, 63, who has been op­er­at­ing her small busi­ness Event Es­sen­tials from the con­fines of her Diego Mar­tin home, is in Mon­tego Bay, Ja­maica, show­cas­ing a new line of re­cy­cled pa­per craft such as wine glass charms, place­mats, dec­o­ra­tive bowls, con­tain­ers and clocks at a co­coa con­fer­ence.

The con­fer­ence comes to an end to­mor­row. It was Thomas' first re­gion­al dis­play. The con­fer­ence-host­ed by the Net­work of Rur­al Women Pro­duc­ers of which Thomas is a mem­ber-will gave her the op­por­tu­ni­ty to dis­play her unique jew­el­ry that is at­trac­tive and eye-catch­ing. Thomas al­so ex­hib­it­ed her re­cy­cled pa­per crafts, most of which are made from skele­tonised leaves. Skele­tonised leaves are those that have been re­duced to their frame­work of veins. Leaves from the peepal tree, which is con­sid­ered high­ly sa­cred in the Hin­du re­li­gion, as well as bay leaves are al­so Thomas' favourite in pro­duc­ing sheets of pa­per.

Hand­made from start to fin­ish

The pa­per prod­ucts are hand­made from start to fin­ish. Us­ing a kitchen blender, Thomas be­gan to ex­per­i­ment mak­ing hand­craft­ed pa­per from re­cy­cled ma­te­ri­als. Leaves, blades of grass, flower petals and re­cy­cled pa­per col­lect­ed from schools, of­fices and ho­tels are pul­verised in­to a pulp and placed in a mould and deck­le where it is washed, flat­tened and dried. Each sheet of pa­per comes out with a unique de­sign. No chem­i­cals or bleach­es are used at any stage of the pa­per mak­ing process. The vari­a­tions in Thomas' prod­ucts are a re­flec­tion of her art­work and dis­tin­guished hand­made prod­uct of en­vi­ron­men­tal in­tegri­ty.

The beads, how­ev­er, are more time-con­sum­ing, Thomas said. Pa­per from mag­a­zines, news­pa­pers, pa­per bags, cat­a­logs or wrap­ping pa­pers are in­di­vid­u­al­ly rolled in­to elon­gat­ed, round­ed or cylin­dri­cal shapes us­ing tooth­picks. This gives the beads its un­usu­al shape. Af­ter van­ish­ing for a wa­ter­proof, smooth and glossy fin­ish, the beads are used in mak­ing bracelets, chains, ear­rings, an­klets and gift sets. The prices of Thomas' jew­el­ry range from $40 up­wards, while jour­nals can be pur­chased from $45.

Great for peo­ple to earn a liv­ing

Thomas said the craft was great for peo­ple who have a hard time earn­ing a liv­ing. "They can learn a skill but stay at home with their chil­dren with­out any over­head costs." To start a busi­ness, Thomas said, all one need­ed was a cre­ative mind, the will pow­er and min­i­mal items. Thomas said her busi­ness had al­lowed her the op­por­tu­ni­ty to pro­vide a sus­tain­able trade and in­come while al­so re­duc­ing the pa­per trash. "The thing is not to throw away any­thing that you can reuse." Sit­ting be­hind her work bench, Thomas, a moth­er of two girls, said what start­ed as a hob­by three years ago, has turned in­to a prof­itable busi­ness which pays her bills.

Through word of mouth, Thomas' busi­ness has grown. So much so, most of her time is spent tu­tor­ing the young and the young at heart on how to make the craft items. Up­on her re­tire­ment in 2009, Thomas, a wid­ow, said she found her­self in a rut, as she had noth­ing to do. "Know­ing the kind of per­son I am, I knew I had to get in­volved in some­thing worth­while and pro­duc­tive to keep me ac­tive." By ac­ci­dent, Thomas said, she stum­bled up­on a craft book, which showed how pa­per jew­el­ry was made and de­cid­ed to give it a try. Though her first at­tempt was not suc­cess­ful, Thomas said she did not give up. "It took a lot of tri­al and er­ror. But that did not stop me from try­ing." Stat­ing that every bead made was done through cre­ative en­deav­ours, Thomas said she en­joys teach­ing the craft. "It's grat­i­fy­ing to see oth­er peo­ple learn a skill."

To­day, Thomas' sculp­tured jew­el­ry draws rave re­views wher­ev­er she goes since she pays spe­cial at­ten­tion to colour schemes, unique de­sign and tex­tures. Thomas even boast­ed about the dura­bil­i­ty of her prod­ucts, claim­ing she ac­ci­den­tal­ly for­got a pair of ear­rings in her pants, which she placed in her wash­ing ma­chine. "The ear­ring went through the en­tire cy­cle with­out dis­in­te­grat­ing. They stood the test of time." Thomas ad­mit­ted that what­ev­er your hob­by pur­suits, you can be over­look­ing an op­por­tu­ni­ty to turn per­son­al in­ter­ests in­to mon­ey-mak­ing en­ter­pris­es. Now in high de­mand, Thomas has giv­en tu­to­ri­als to adults through the Min­istry of Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment. She al­so teach­es pri­ma­ry and sec­ondary school stu­dents up­on re­quest.