I love things made from firefighter gear, but the Valor bag is the best I've seen yet. Out of my budget, but maybe within yours. If you have a firefighter in your life, Etsy seller cleverscene will gladly make a custom bag with your retired firefighter coat. Her other bags are cute, too.
Images from cleverscene. Via ReNest.
That's it. I'm moving to Portland. Because if I lived there, I would make friends with the ladies from bright designlab. In partnership with Hammer & Hand, they crafted these fantastic pieces of furniture made of reclaimed wood. As if they knew what would make my heart melt, they added industrial metal details. Check that steel band around the coffee table. 
Click through to their website or Design*Sponge to see more photos. Can't wait to see what they do next.
I've been searching high and low for the elusive perfect lights for our new bathroom. There are so many amazing options, and in my efforts to find cool (and affordable) green lighting, I came across these recycled bottle lights by Jerry Kott. Mr. Kott takes reclaimed wine bottles, carefully cuts them apart, frosts them, and reassembles them into light fixtures, table lamps, vases, and other lovelies.
I don't know much about Dennis Slootweg, but I have a huge labatory crush on this furniture. He uses reclaimed industrial metal, then reworks it into things like this.
Lots more on his website. Wow, wow, and wow.
Check out this fence made of bike frames. The comment section on the original ReNest post has a lively discussion about whether this is (a) attractive or (b) appropriate reuse. Either way, it's interesting....
Lauren Tickle reconfigured U.S. currency into stunning jewelry as part of her Value Exploration project, where she considers wealth, materialism, and why we feel the need to show our worth to the outside world.
Images from Lauren Tickle. Via Inhabitat.
I'm not sure how "green" this is, but take a look anyway. Paola Volpi uses humble and industrial materials to make refined, modern jewelry. It seems that most of her materials are new, but you can imagine applying her same approach to used or salvaged items, and then it gets really interesting. It's worth a spin through her portfolio.
The addition of fine jewelry details (pearls, clasps, fittings) pull it all together. I'm especially smitten with the use of oil filters and electrical wiring. Any way you slice it, the results are stunning.
Images from Paola Volpi. Via ecouterre.
Dutch furniture designer Peet Hein Eek mills these bowls from wood scraps. No newcomer to "green" design, the artist has been using scrap wood in furniture designs since the 1990s. These are CRAZY expensive, but it's an interesting idea. I like how rough and imperfect they look.
While the world is jumping on the iPhone/iPad bandwagon, I’m still sticking to my Luddite tendencies and basic flip phone (which, as my husband complains is usually at the bottom of my bag with a dead battery). However, I can’t help but drool a little over all the wonderful design that’s happening in the Apple adjacent spaces. I’m madly in love with these stylish bamboo cases from Grove Made. They have some stunning ones ready to go, or you can upload your own artwork for a custom number.
The cases are made in the USA, and they have an oh-so-clever strategy to use the offcuts to make the packaging, which has an extended life as a mini photo frame.
Packaging becomes photo frame
Over at Martha Stewart, the craft department went a bit nuts with leftover wool felt scraps, creating this stunning felt floor mat.
It reminds me of the seat slices sold at Branch. I’ve always loved the slices, but never really thought how easy they would be to DIY.
Images from Martha Stewart and Branch Home. Via re-nest.
Check out the Flash Gordon line of black polyester resin jewelry embedded with recycled circuit board pieces and a few computer parts. Handmade in Rio, they are interesting, recycled, and not very expensive.
I love the modern shapes. You can see more in person at Sobral’s NY showroom, or online at Sobral USA. 
Innovative lighting ideas from a showcase of Israeli design students at the Milan Furniture Fair. Some of the more interesting examples:
Many of these lighting ideas would be impossible without the advances in low-power, low-heat light bulbs, which allow the use of more delicate (and often more eco-friendly) materials.
Via TreeHugger.
With spring springing all around, you may be dreaming on long, lovely bike rides. If your vintage ride needs a stylish new fender, consider these hand-made wooden ones from Red Tail Fenders (via their Etsy shop).
Images from Red Tail Fenders. Via design*sponge.
Emeco has remade their classic 1944 aluminum Navy chair in recycled PET (rPET, mixed with glass filler and pigment). They have partnered with Coca Cola to use reclaimed soda bottles. Each 111 Navy Chair™ will consume approximately 111 20-oz. plastic bottles, sourced from a Spartanburg, SC recycling plant. The chairs will be molded in North Carolina and sold via DWR retailers starting this June. They’ll still be a bit expensive for a plastic chair, but I like the direction this is headed, where we use locally generated recycling to make products that have iconic styling and are designed to last. Unfortunately, with all the fillers, I’m guessing the chairs can’t really be recycled again at the end of life, but with luck, they’ll last a long long time.
We've seen beetle block items before, but none so lovely as these by Straight Line Designs. The mountain pine beetle has been devastating forests in Canada, and several companies are trying to salvage the blue-stained "denim pine" wood into new products.
I like the look of the river rocks and the rock wall.
Images from Straighline Designs. Via Re-Nest.
Nervous System has done it again with their latest line of math and nature-inspired jewelry. The Xylem items are based on vein formations in roots and leaves. Lovely.
Images from Nervous System. Via NotCot.
