DUMPSTER DIVING FOR BUILDING MATERIALS

I found this dandy little clip in Greenclips, an email subscription-based newsletter. You can subscribe to Greenclips here:

In a surprising twist on continuing education, residents of the Gowanus section of Brooklyn paid $20 to take Dumpster Diving 301, a course on fishing for free home-improvement materials—things like scratched doors and mismatched kitchen cupboards—from construction waste bins. Students in the seminar, sponsored by an "art combine" called the Madagascar Institute, where do-it-yourselfers trying to cut construction costs by sorting through nail- and-grime-ridden rejectamenta. Their leaders were two seasoned teachers, Omar Freilla and Maureen Flaherty. Like a lot of other Dumpster divers, Ms. Flaherty and Mr. Freilla—who said he and his wife plan to buy and restore a home in the South Bronx using found materials—practice the sport not only to conserve cash but also to decrease Earth-clogging waste. One of Ms. Flaherty’s biggest tips was to watch for building permits and construction-size dumpsters. Meanwhile, Build It Green! NYC, a 17,500-square-foot low-end ‘Lowe's,’ opened last month in Astoria, Queens, with stacks of reclaimed kitchen cabinets, mismatched doors and carefully mined wood molding, along with sinks, radiators, handrails— even a few new Andersen windows. -- 1st printed in The New York Times, 24 Mar 05, p. D10, by Carole Braden