VOA标准英语2010年-Green Crafters Combine Beauty, Functio

Jamie Galloway is an eco-friendly fiber¹ artist.

A recent graduate of the Savannah College of Art and Design, she was among 700 exhibiters at the American Craft Council Show in Baltimore, Maryland displaying their handmade jewelry², clothing, and home décor.

Green spinner

Galloway used giant knitting needles the size of ski poles to make the scarf she's wearing, a technique she learned during an internship³ in the British West Indies working with cotton free of pesticides⁴ and chemicals.

"We cultivated the cotton, picked it, hand seeded it, and spun⁵ it," she says.

Jamie Galloway uses giant knitting needles to make items made of cotton free of pesticides and chemicals.

In her Savannah, Georgia studio, Galloway spins organic cotton that has a natural brown, green and yellow color. She says she plans to engage other spinners to follow her lead and help revive a folk tradition for people in communities across the state.

"People are starting to realize that our life is so fast-paced that we miss out on the things in life that mean the most, which is human connectedness and taking the time to enrich our culture as well as individuals and teaching the arts of handicraft such as hand spinning and or weaving or felting gives us that culture back."

Amy Faust is a jewelry maker⁶ from Oakland, California.

Recycled gems⁸

The necklaces, bracelets¹⁰, earrings¹¹ and pins in the display cases in Baltimore are made from beach glass, recycled bottles, chipped dinner plates and pottery¹² shards¹³.

Amy Faust creates jewelry made from beach glass, recycled bottles, chipped dinner plates and pottery shards.

A customer is awed¹⁴ by a bracelet⁹ with a large pale green stone. Faust tells her it's crafted from a 1940s era Coca-Cola bottle.  "I love the fact that this is recycled," the woman says.

Nothing goes to waste in her California studio where Faust works with the broken and chipped objects rescued from thrift¹⁵ stores, flea¹⁶ markets and garage sales and with precision tools fashions them into something new.

"I am really disturbed by waste," she says. "I recycle everything. I make the jewelry because I really love the colors. I love the materials, but I also really think that it's kind of a vehicle to talk about recycling and how you can reuse things and inspire people. And, if I wear a necklace with a coke bottle, people come up to me and ask, 'What is that gem⁷ stone?'"

Poetic¹⁷ purses

Like Amy Faust, Caitlin Phillips thinks recycling is central to everything she does. Phillips turns discarded books into purses.

Phillips, who once worked in a used bookstore, loves old science and math textbooks.  Her favorites are ones with bold colors from the 1960s. "People will say, 'Why are you carrying a geometry book to a party? And I'll reply: 'It's not a book. It's my purse!'"

Any old book will do, from Jane Austen, Sherlock Holmes and the complete works of Shakespeare to "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" and the "Chicago Manual of Style" for writers and editors. Phillips helps customers match a memory or a mood.  Little details matter to Phillips. 

Those are books that have been turned into purses on artist Caitlin Phillips' shelf.

She tells the buyer about the vintage button that closes the purse, explaining that she picked it up from a lady selling mounds¹⁸ of buttons at Eastern Market in Washington, D.C.  "So I picked this one out and found the right book for it."

Phillips works out of her home in Mt. Rainier, Maryland, which has that musty smell of a used bookstore. "That's my favorite thing, that smell," she says. "It's a dust smell and essentially¹⁹ a smell of decay when books have that old smell."

In her home studio Phillips has shelves lined with books waiting to be purses. She no longer feels guilty about tearing out all the pages. Her favorite part of the 12-hour process from pattern-to-purse is matching the fabric²⁰ to the cover.

"If I don't find the right fabric, I don't make the purse. It has to look like the fabric almost grew out of the book.  It's for the synergy of it. I mean otherwise, it's just fabric glued into a book. It's not special. So the fabric really makes a big difference."

The purses that Phillips crafts, like Jamie Galloway's organic cotton fabrics²¹ or Amy Faust's coke-bottle jewelry, are accessories that are both beautiful and functional²².

Phillips says like any accessory, "If you are going to show off your books, why not take them with you?"
 

1 fiber   

n.纤维，纤维质

参考例句：

• The basic structural unit of yarn is the fiber.纤维是纱的基本结构单元。
• The material must be free of fiber clumps.这种材料必须无纤维块。

2 jewelry   

n.（jewllery）（总称）珠宝

参考例句：

• The burglars walked off with all my jewelry.夜盗偷走了我的全部珠宝。
• Jewelry and lace are mostly feminine belongings.珠宝和花边多数是女性用品。

3 internship   

n.实习医师，实习医师期

参考例句：

• an internship at a television station 在电视台的实习期
• a summer internship with a small stipend 薪水微薄的暑期实习

4 pesticides   

n.杀虫剂( pesticide的名词复数 )；除害药物

参考例句：

• vegetables grown without the use of pesticides 未用杀虫剂种植的蔬菜
• There is a lot of concern over the amount of herbicides and pesticides used in farming. 人们对农业上灭草剂和杀虫剂的用量非常担忧。 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 spun   

v.纺，杜撰，急转身

参考例句：

• His grandmother spun him a yarn at the fire.他奶奶在火炉边给他讲故事。
• Her skilful fingers spun the wool out to a fine thread.她那灵巧的手指把羊毛纺成了细毛线。

6 maker   

n.制造者，制造商

参考例句：

• He is a trouble maker，You must be distant with him.他是个捣蛋鬼，你不要跟他在一起。
• A cabinet maker must be a master craftsman.家具木工必须是技艺高超的手艺人。

7 gem   

n.宝石，珠宝；受爱戴的人 [同]jewel

参考例句：

• The gem is beyond my pocket.这颗宝石我可买不起。
• The little gem is worth two thousand dollars.这块小宝石价值两千美元。

8 gems   

growth； economy； management； and customer satisfaction 增长

参考例句：

• a crown studded with gems 镶有宝石的皇冠
• The apt citations and poetic gems have adorned his speeches. 贴切的引语和珠玑般的诗句为他的演说词增添文采。

9 bracelet   

n.手镯，臂镯

参考例句：

• The jeweler charges lots of money to set diamonds in a bracelet.珠宝匠要很多钱才肯把钻石镶在手镯上。
• She left her gold bracelet as a pledge.她留下她的金手镯作抵押品。

10 bracelets   

n.手镯，臂镯( bracelet的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The lamplight struck a gleam from her bracelets. 她的手镯在灯光的照射下闪闪发亮。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• On display are earrings, necklaces and bracelets made from jade, amber and amethyst. 展出的有用玉石、琥珀和紫水晶做的耳环、项链和手镯。 来自《简明英汉词典》

11 earrings   

n.耳环( earring的名词复数 )；耳坠子

参考例句：

• a pair of earrings 一对耳环
• These earrings snap on with special fastener. 这付耳环是用特制的按扣扣上去的。 来自《简明英汉词典》

12 pottery   

n.陶器，陶器场

参考例句：

• My sister likes to learn art pottery in her spare time.我妹妹喜欢在空余时间学习陶艺。
• The pottery was left to bake in the hot sun.陶器放在外面让炎热的太阳烘晒焙干。

13 shards   

n.（玻璃、金属或其他硬物的）尖利的碎片( shard的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Eyewitnesses spoke of rocks and shards of glass flying in the air. 目击者称空中石块和玻璃碎片四溅。 来自辞典例句
• Ward, Josh Billings, and a host of others have survived only in scattered shards of humour. 沃德、比林斯和许多别的作家能够留传下来的只是些幽默的残章断简。 来自辞典例句

14 awed   

adj.充满敬畏的，表示敬畏的v.使敬畏，使惊惧( awe的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The audience was awed into silence by her stunning performance. 观众席上鸦雀无声，人们对他出色的表演感到惊叹。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• I was awed by the huge gorilla. 那只大猩猩使我惊惧。 来自《简明英汉词典》

15 thrift   

adj.节约，节俭；n.节俭，节约

参考例句：

• He has the virtues of thrift and hard work.他具备节俭和勤奋的美德。
• His thrift and industry speak well for his future.他的节俭和勤勉预示着他美好的未来。

16 flea   

n.跳蚤

参考例句：

• I'll put a flea in his ear if he bothers me once more.如果他再来打扰的话，我就要对他不客气了。
• Hunter has an interest in prowling around a flea market.亨特对逛跳蚤市场很感兴趣。

17 poetic   

adj.富有诗意的，有诗人气质的，善于抒情的

参考例句：

• His poetic idiom is stamped with expressions describing group feeling and thought.他的诗中的措辞往往带有描写群体感情和思想的印记。
• His poetic novels have gone through three different historical stages.他的诗情小说创作经历了三个不同的历史阶段。

18 mounds   

土堆，土丘( mound的名词复数 )； 一大堆

参考例句：

• We had mounds of tasteless rice. 我们有成堆成堆的淡而无味的米饭。
• Ah! and there's the cemetery' - cemetery, he must have meant. 'You see the mounds? 啊，这就是同墓，”——我想他要说的一定是公墓，“看到那些土墩了吗？

19 essentially   

adv.本质上，实质上，基本上

参考例句：

• Really great men are essentially modest.真正的伟人大都很谦虚。
• She is an essentially selfish person.她本质上是个自私自利的人。

20 fabric   

n.织物，织品，布；构造，结构，组织

参考例句：

• The fabric will spot easily.这种织品很容易玷污。
• I don't like the pattern on the fabric.我不喜欢那块布料上的图案。

21 fabrics   

织物( fabric的名词复数 )； 布； 构造； （建筑物的）结构（如墙、地面、屋顶）：质地

参考例句：

• cotton fabrics and synthetics 棉织物与合成织物
• The fabrics are merchandised through a network of dealers. 通过经销网点销售纺织品。

22 functional   

adj.为实用而设计的，具备功能的，起作用的

参考例句：

• The telephone was out of order,but is functional now.电话刚才坏了，但现在可以用了。
• The furniture is not fancy,just functional.这些家具不是摆着好看的，只是为了实用。