Old furniture should be repurposed

I’m still living with the horror after having once driven into the Killarney dump and finding a beautiful, quarter-sawn oak antique pump organ dumped off as garbage.

Beside it — a gorgeous, mahogany full-sized upright piano lying on its face after being pushed off a truck, trailer. Who does this?

I saved the pump organ. Brought it to Winnipeg, advertised it in the free section, from which it was adopted by a fab couple who took it to restore. I also got down on hands and knees in the stinky garbage and saved the front panel of the piano (sits above the foot pedals) to repurpose someday.

So many of us in the boomer generation have our parents’ older wooden furniture, pianos, tables, etc., that have been handed down to our generation, and with the ever-increasing number of us dying off each year, a great deal of that furniture faces exponentially increasing peril.

Most of the post-boomer generation just doesn’t seem to want it and my fear is that much of that beautiful, old-growth wood, much of it excellent examples of Old World craftsmanship, is going to wind up at the dump.

Hypothetical scenario: we’ve croaked, our kids are cleaning out the house for resale and nobody wants the furniture. It will take more time and effort than it’s worth to sell, so perhaps reluctantly, it gets designated as "landfill" and away it goes. TRAGIC!!

Staying globally local, so many homes, apartments and condos have a plethora of these "heirlooms," and as boomers bite the dust, too many of these treasures are simply, and sadly, doomed.

I mean, if you check the giveaway ads posted via social media regularly, you’ll always find a piano being offered free, "just bring muscle to pick it up." That part is definitely understandable.

So what are our options when it comes to unwanted old pianos, furniture, etc.?

Well artist Karla McEachern, formerly of Manitoba and currently of B.C., came up with an excellent idea. With one of her specialties being jewelry making, in 2014, she applied for, and won, a grant from the Manitoba Arts Council to repurpose her parents’ unwanted piano into a variety of jewelry pieces, which she did.

Then, with what was left over from that piano and a couple of others she’d been given, she created a stunning piece of wall art that now resides for all to admire on a wall at Columbia Insurance Brokers in Headingley!

The jewelry created ultimately found loving homes via the Manitoba Crafts Council First Fridays Program.

Since that first innovative creative repurposing/recycling adventure, Karla tells me she has now turned 13 more pianos into art pieces and jewelry, turning potential trash into contemporary, useful beauty.

I’m hoping a lot more of this creative use of truly valuable resources will arise in time to save so much irreplaceable Old World material for future use.

Also on display in Columbia Insurance, a cool piece of artwork Marshall Piper made from pieces of an old organ.

Another appreciator of old furniture potential, Lori S., even sent me a pic of her old stereo, noting: "This old Hi-Fi is my pride and joy. I doubt anyone will want it when I croak, but I will enjoy it till that time comes."

Bravo. If you go before me, which I very much doubt, I’ll take it!!!

I believe it would be a valuable undertaking, in cities and towns worldwide, especially here in Winnipeg for starters, to set up collection points where old pianos, furniture and instruments of all varieties can be donated for crafts people, artists, builders to use, and perhaps even the instruments themselves adopted by someone who wants to save a majestic old piano, organ, or whatever.

I would love to own and run a store that features this sort of "salvage", with maybe 50 per cent of the profits going to various charities, the goods themselves being sold at bargain basement prices. What an adventure that would be.

Us artsy folk have curious minds, or perhaps better described as minds brimming with curiosity. Perhaps both descriptions fit. But as I sit here at my dad’s gorgeous, antique quarter-sawn oak roll-top desk, I find myself wondering where the tree or trees this desk was built from grew, how many winters and summers, storms of every variety they experienced and maybe even if a bear scratched its backside on any of the trees this wood was taken from.

Absolutely no worries in this household that any of this gorgeous, precious old wood will ever hit the dump or a bonfire and post-mortality I will be watching diligently from above... or below... to see it remains appreciated and protected.

If some of you already perhaps know of someone, or some organization, locally that is accepting donations of this sort for repurposing/recycling or resale to raise funds for charity, please let me know via my e-mail below and I’ll help give it all the publicity I can. Thanks.

Comments or feedback, love to hear from you!

lmustard1948@gmail.com