Rewind Reuse Center in Export aims to turn odds and ends into arts and crafts
Val Paulisick of Murrysville is a maker. She sees a box full of paper scraps and odds and ends, and begins imagining the possibilities.
“I want to save things from ending up in the landfill,” she said.
She wants others to do the same, which is why she opened the nonprofit Rewind Reuse Center on Washington Avenue in Export.
The shop is stuffed with colorful bits and pieces, from brightly hued cloth swatches and bins full of rubber stamps to intricately-furnished dollhouses and crafting supplies by the pound. Raw materials can be purchased for a nominal fee.
The goal is to open customers’ imagination, Paulisick said.
“Not everyone who comes to us is an artist,” she said. “I’m a maker: some things I can do, and some I can’t. It’s an open workshop.”
Collecting materials from donations, estate sales and almost any other method of acquisition, Paulisick has partnered with Achieva to host maker workshops for people with disabilities as well as with the county’s Area Agency on Aging to do pop-up workshops at senior centers in Greensburg, Herminie, West Newton, Jeannette and Monessen.
The space in Export can comfortably hold a group of about 35, and Paulisick comes up with a new theme for projects each week, “so that if someone wants to do something but just doesn’t have an idea, we have plenty,” she said.
The space will feature a rotating artist gallery each month, and Paulisick is also a loan collector for the Carnegie Museum of Natural History. This month a collection of Native American art and artifacts are on display.
As a longtime social worker and head of Franklin Regional’s Junior Gardeners program for 13 years, Paulisick has seen the value that a creative project can foster in people.
“I like the community aspect of it,” she said. “There are a lot of people who don’t belong to a church or a community group, and they need a place like this.”
She invited the community to stop in and let their own creativity guide them.
“And if you have no clue, we have drawers full of ideas,” she said.
The Rewind Reuse Center is open from 11 to 8 p.m. on Wednesdays, 11 to 5 p.m. Thursdays and Fridays, and 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on the second and third Saturday of every month.
For more, see RewindReuseCenter.org.
Patrick Varine is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Patrick at 724-850-2862, [email protected] or via Twitter .