Local artist feeds the birds with recycled dinnerware

By Rita A. Leonard

The Bee, Jul 7, 2010

Sue Ross, with her husband Doran, create bird feeders and planters from cast-off dinnerware, and sell them at Downtown Portland’s Saturday Market.

Rita A. Leonard / THE BEE

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Birds returning north this spring started encountering feeders made from recycled dinnerware. They were the work of Reed neighborhood crafter Sue Ross, who creates “green” bird feeders and planters from recycled cups, bowls, and plates.

“They’re all from garage sales and thrift stores,” she says. “I choose them for their color and stability.” These creations are then sold downtown at the Saturday Market, in styles ranging from wall-mounted and pedestal types to hanging models.

Sue Ross and her husband, Doran, have been craft entrepreneurs for about 35 years, but only recently started making the bird feeders. “We started out making ‘Comic Art’, sculpting small wax animals that we sold all over the west coast,” she recalls. “When cheap overseas resin figures drove us out of business, we started making potpourri instead.

“Currently we make the bird feeders and planters that we sell on weekends, and at five or six shows around the Northwest. We’re changing all the time. Soon we’ll be getting back into sculpting — but it will be with raku clay.”

The Ross’ cup-and-saucer bird feeders are drilled with drain holes, and hung from thin stainless steel ‘aircraft cable’, which is versatile and also impervious to squirrel chewing. Some of the feeders are mounted on copper posts, to “plant” around the garden. Larger hanging models made of shallow bowls use an inverted plate overhead as a rain shield.

“We also customize, if requested,” adds Sue, who decorates the pieces with beads, wire twists, and other ornaments that complement the color scheme.

The “face planters” she and her husband create can also be used as wall art or bird feeders. These creations feature bottle-cap eyes, springy-wire hair, and mouths made of half of a cup glued firmly in place. “They look really nice with succulents and ‘air plants’,” she smiles. “The more recyclable items I can use, the better.”

Sue and Doran continually experiment with new crafting ideas as they run across new materials. “We need to have more creativity in our lives,” she says. “Kids can learn a lot from experimenting with creative crafts.”

And the joy of making something fun and useful from items that might otherwise go in a landfill is just another way of “being green”.