Eco-Friendly Valentine’s Gifts

Ten Thousand Villages Offers Eco-Friendly Valentine’s Gifts – Valentine’s Collection Includes Recycled and Sustainable Raw Materials

AKRON, Pa. – Ten Thousand Villages, a fair trade retailer with 74 locations across the country and online at tenthousandvillages.com, offers eco-friendly Valentine’s Day Gifts for your love. Choose from pins made from recycled soda cans, hand-carved kisii stone statues or olive wood hearts carved from pruned olive tree branches.

Your Valentine will be delighted with a gift from Ten Thousand Villages:

Love Me! Pin

Love Me! That is the message you will share with this delightful little running heart pin. Made from locally sourced recycled soda can metal and wire, each pin has a heart shape made from predominantly red-colored cans. The heart also has a flower made from beads and wire. Handcrafted by artisans working with Bombolulu Workshops in Mombasa, Kenya. Measures 2.5 inches long by 2 inches high.
Suggested retail price, $12.

Embracing Couple Kisii Statue

Embracing couple expresses the essence of love. Artisans in Tabaka, Kenya hand-carve the Kisii stone sculpture by hand. Kisii soapstone, found only in Kenya, is a soft stone, easy to carve into many forms. Its satiny finish is achieved through multiple stages of sanding, followed by waxing.
The sculpture measures 4 inches long by 2 inches wide by six inches high.
Suggested retail price, $24.

Olive Wood Paperweight

Express your love with this delightful little heart-shaped paperweight, hand-carved in durable and beautifully grained olive wood. This piece reflects both the fine craftsmanship of Palestinian artisans and the artistry of nature. Carvers do not cut
down trees for their craft, but rather use pruned branches removed to enhance the health of the trees.
Measures 3 inches in diameter by 1.25 inches high.
Suggested retail price, $16.

“I Love You” Puzzle

Say “I love you” to the puzzle lover in your life. Using simple tools, artisans in India create this unique heart puzzle. Taken apart, the shesham wood puzzle pieces spell a stylized “I love you.” Put together, they form a heart.
Measures 5.5 inches square.
Suggested retail price, $20.

Poetic Love Card

Give a poetic valentine card to your love. Featuring a Bengali poem and translation, this card quotes the poet Jasimuddin Mollah. In red silk paper with Bengali text, silver heart, gold leaves and bow. Insert translates the poem: “Let’s go to a green serene village where vine and leaves lie together in a deep shadow of forest.” Jasimuddin Mollah (1903-1976) was a renowned Bengali poet commonly known in Bangladesh as Polli Kobi, the Rural Poet.
Suggested retail price, $4.

About Ten Thousand Villages

A fair trade retailer, Ten Thousand Villages offers gifts and home decor, jewelry and personal accessories made with recycled and sustainable materials.

Ten Thousand Villages has been nationally recognized for its commitment to social and environmental responsibility. Ten Thousand Villages received the Co-op America Award for Green Business of the Year in 2005 and the Longtime Leadership Award in 2006. In 2008, 2009 and 2010 Ten Thousand Villages was named one of the “World’s Most Ethical Companies” by the Ethisphere Institute and Forbes Magazine.

Ten Thousand Villages offers products from more than 130 artisan groups in 38 countries via a network of more than 390 retail outlets throughout the United States.

For more than 60 years, Ten Thousand Villages has established fair, long-term buying relationships in places where skilled artisans lack opportunities for stable income. Ten Thousand Villages is a nonprofit program of Mennonite Central Committee, a worldwide relief, development and peace ministry of Anabaptist churches.