Plastics Week in Sidmouth: and the Plastic Warriors >>> making art down on the beach at the Sea Fest

The high point of a week looking at what we do with plastic was the Sea Fest - and its focus on getting us to think about how we use the stuff:
Futures Forum: Sidmouth Sea Fest > special focus on ‘rethinking plastics’ > Saturday 12th May

In the morning we had stories on plastics at sea from Jo Earlam:
Futures Forum: Tuamor the Turtle comes to the Sidmouth Sea Fest > Saturday 12th May

Throughout the day we had catering without plastic:
Futures Forum: Sidmouth Sea Fest > full day programme

And there was plenty of activity down on the beach: 

Clean Up #5 SAS Sidmouth Sea Fest May 12th 2018

Posted on May 22, 2018

I apologise for the lack of enthusiasm for this post – not posted the same day or near as usual – but I really wasn’t well on this day but dragged myself along as it had been a long standing plan to start Sea Fest 2018 with a beach clean. I had borrowed 52 children’s pickers from Devon County Council, as well as getting our usual set from Streetscene (thanks Barry) so we had plenty of pickers down on the Ham, but a relatively small group this time (25 or so) but they more than made up for their small numbers by their huge effort. All said the beach was pretty clean but we still managed to fill up 3 very full black bags when we decanted and sorted, plus 3 bags of recycling, which Tesco Express Sidmouth took away for us (before I took any pics sorry!) There were a great many nappy wipes this time, weirdly – and the ones I found were all the same sort so maybe it was just one person.

Along with Coco, we made a beautiful picture in the sandpit with our plastic that we had collected, and she then carried on making art with the children afterwards, before it was all disposed of properly. It made a very visual statement for them to see just what was on the beach (and it looked pretty awful when it was all random, compared to the lovely clean sand in the rest of the sandpit).

Then our lovely Anne came along with some random bits she had picked up and we had a good close look at them. There was a real assortment of some of the usual suspects (plastic lids, cotton buds, balloon pieces, cigarette ends) but lots of nurdles and unusual things too. (Sorry for the awful picture, I really wasn’t well!)

Thanks to Louise for making a huge effort and keeping the festival almost entirely plastic free. Just a few people were seen wandering around with Costa cups and Coke bottles (not bought at the festival!) which only slightly marred it. (Why they’d want to drink that when so many other shops in town do great coffee in much better cups, I don’t know.)

Dx

Clean Up #5 SAS Sidmouth Sea Fest May 12th 2018 – Sidmouth Plastic Warriors

Here's the newsletter at the time from Denise Bickley of the Plastic Warriors:
Futures Forum: Sidmouth Plastics Week > final events > Matt Harvey on Friday 11th May > Beach Clean on Saturday 12th May
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