Remnants reborn - turning fashion's off-cuts into beautiful, artisan paper

As an 'ethical' business owner I keenly feel the responsibility of adding to the volume of fashion produced for Western consumption and the impact that has on the environment - I want Dilli Grey to tread as lightly as possible and that means ensuring minimal wastage in our production process.

The handmade, small-run nature of what we create means there isn't the volume of wastage that mass-market fashion churns out, but I love it when the dots connect and we find a natural solution that not only reduces wastage even further... but creates a beautiful by-product, too!

Our hand-block printing artisan in Jaipur introduced us to Moin on our last trip. Moin collects remnants from the fashion and textile factories of Jaipur and takes them back to his workshop. There they are pulped and processed, by hand, milled and turned into beautiful paper. It's a messy process but not only does using these 'discards' make it a viable business for Moin, but it embodies our tagline trio of 'ethical, beautiful, handmade' in one!

We have taken it one step further and using Moin's handmade paper, we have created journals, cotton-bound in the off-cuts of our signature hand-block prints - reducing the wastage even further! They are such a beautiful and natural extension of what we do - great for paper and pen list keepers like me, for journalling (something I know a lot of you love!) and are finished with a traditional Indian cord closure.

After a couple of hours watching the men in the workshop pulping, pressing, drying and cutting every sheet by hand, we couldn't resist commissioning Moin to make something uniquely ours for Christmas.

Here is a photo (taken on Moin's grainy iphone!) that landed in my inbox last week - Dilli Grey's wallpaper design, printed on handmade paper for our Christmas gift boxes! Lined in our signature green - I am so proud that something as 'throwaway' as packaging, now has a beautiful story of its own to tell.

You can add a gift box to any purchase between now and Christmas for just £3.50, or shop our gift box edits here.