Enjoy a glass of wine with a bath? Why not indulge your passion for fine wine by recycling all of those corks you’ve been collecting and creating a stylish eco-chic recycled wine cork bath mat?
Wait, what? How could you possibly consider putting wine corks in a bathroom of all places? Think about it. Cork is the preferred method to sealing wine bottles, known for its ability to lock out liquid, and keep vino fresh. If it’s good enough to preserve your favorite bottles of wine, shouldn’t it be durable enough to craft with?
Cork has amazing properties that are highly desired in bathroom décor, too. Cork is inherently antimicrobial, antibacterial, hypoallergenic and resists mildew. You know, all of the benefits that companies try to impart on their products with the use of chemical additives to non-natural fibers and materials. Yet cork offers them up naturally, in a material that comes from the bark of a tree and is a more sustainable choice.
Oh, and you can probably get all that you need for free. So what’s stopping you? Here’s how to make a bath mat from recycled wine corks:
- First, you need corks. Like, 100-400 of them! Don’t worry. If you haven’t consumed that many bottles of wine (or you have, but you just haven’t kept the corks from the bottles of wine that you have consumed), just ask around. Scam some corks from your friends, or better yet, ask a bartender or wine shop if they could give you corks from opened bottles of wine.
- Next, you can either use a hot glue gun to attach corks to a non-slip backing, or you can stack up corks in a wooden frame.
- Among the easiest way to make a wine cork bath mat is to stack up the corks inside a wooden frame with raised sides, such as a shadow box. If you’re crafty, you could nail together pieces of wood to create a shadow box frame. However, make sure that there is a base underneath attached. Otherwise, reuse an old shadowbox or purchase one new.
- Now, simply add the corks. Place them vertically so that you can see the end of the wine cork. This will take the most amount of corks. Or you can place them horizontally so that you see the entire width of the corks. If you would like to make the wine corks more stable, hot glue them together on the edges. Or just place them in as tightly as possible so that they do not move around, without the need of glue.
- Another way to create a bath mat out of wine corks is to cut the corks in half and lay them flat on a non-slip base. A piece of corkboard could work well as a base, or a piece of non-stick shelf liner with a rubbery gripped feel. Cut the base to the size that you would like. With a knife, cut wine corks carefully in half. Glue each half to the base, stacking the corks side by side in rows.
Now go uncork your creative side – and that favorite bottle of wine!
Feature image courtesy of Sam Howzit