Finding beauty in the recycling bin

One person’s trash is another person’s... pastime? For many, junk mail has transformed over the years from annoying clutter to potential art materials with the rise of junk journaling.

Junk journaling is a creative, sustainable, and highly personalized art form that involves assembling a book from recycled, everyday materials — like receipts, old books, mail, and fabric — to document life or express creativity. It focuses on embracing imperfection, making it a stress-free, customizable and budget-friendly alternative to traditional, structured scrap-booking.

For those looking to turn transform their everyday scraps into memories and artistic expression, the Marathon County Library is hosting a junk journal lab at the Wausau headquarters on Tuesday, March 24 from 5:30-7 p.m. For this event, participants should plan to bring their own journal. For those who are new to the craft, the library can also provide instructions and materials for creating a simple envelope junk journal.

Librarian Julie Kinny, who has experience with the craft, said junk journals can vary significantly from person to person.

“Some people just collect random things that come through their household, like literally junk mail. Other people are a little more picky and they’ll collect things that they think are beautiful or pretty -- like things from magazines, maybe cards that they get or photos, things of that nature,” Kinney said. “It’s just an opportunity to combine those different elements into something new.”

Junk journals can be made in an actual blank journal, or they can be crafted on “junk” themselves, like an envelope. Kinney said some people will even blend tea and water, or water paint, to stain the pages a different color before starting. Whatever their base layer, these journals are commonly comprised of photos, art, words or text found in materials that were bound for the recycling bin.

“It’s about the kind of the freedom to take stuff that is just normally be thrown out or recycled and turn it into something new and exciting and different,” Kinney said.

Above all else, Kinney said, its a relaxing craft that is well-suited to be completed in the company of others.

“It’s relaxing. It’s just nice to sit, it kind of hearkens back for some people to that elementary school vibe where there’s a lot of freedom,” Kinney said. “You can cut out pictures that you really like or you think are really gorgeous and enhance them or decorate them in some way. If you find something you make is really exceptional you can certainly frame it and hang it up in your house.”

For those interested in attending the junk journal lab on March 24, now’s the time to start stocking up on junk mail. If not, the library will share a variety of junk materials and crafting supplies with attendees at the event. The junk journal lab is free and open to adults with no registration required.