Furniture fabric discards find good use
Quilts delivered to children's hospital patients
Heath Combs -- Furniture Today, October 30, 2008
ORLANDO, Fla. — Furniture industry fabrics that may have once gone to a landfill are finding a better use at the Arnold Palmer Children's Hospital here.Quilts produced from discarded industry fabrics were first delivered to young patients three weeks ago through the Green Initiative for Furniture and Textiles, or GIFFT, program.
The initial delivery was made by representatives of participants in GIFFT, including Rooms To Go, Quilts for Kids, Sunbury Textiles, Disney Epcot and Avangard Innovative. About 60 quilts were delivered, according to Linda Arye, founding president of Quilts For Kids.
 Rooms To Go’s Ezra Yanowitz, general manager of the company’s Lakeland Distribution Center, delivers a quilt made from upholstery fabric to a patient at Arnold Palmer Children’s Hospital in Orlando, Fla. |
The furniture fabric quilt program was created by SWIFT, the Sample Waste Initiative for Furniture and Textiles, and by Houston-based recycling company Avangard Innovative and Yardley, Pa.-based charity Quilts for Kids.
Quilts for Kids is a network of volunteer quilters founded in 2000 by interior designer Linda Ayre. The volunteers make quilts for children who are in hospitals or other care facilities, and has kept over a million pounds of fabric out of landfills.
Seffner, Fla.-based Rooms To Go is one of the contributors to the GIFFT program and has donated about 6,000 pounds of fabric so far.
"Fabric is no longer being sent to landfill and at the same time we get to help out other people," said Nick Macnichol, senior industrial engineer at the retailer, who participated in the delivery
Program officials said more than 10 tons of fabric may be donated this year.
The program was kicked off in July when about a ton of material from excess end rolls or discontinued fabric was collected at Rooms To Go's Lakeland, Fla., distribution center.
Click here to read a Furniture/Today story about the SWIFT program.
Talkback
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The Swift Org. may want to look into the upholstry plants in this country for more donations of...
Terry Ellis - 2008-10-30 10:52:36
