MATERIALS Click on any image to find out more about each material
HORN AND BONE Horn_and_bone-1 Horn_and_bone-2
  • No animals are killed or maimed for our horn and bone
  • All horn and bone is recycled from the food industry
  • Textures created by polishing, scouring, carving and incising
  • Color variants achieved with environmentally safe tea and henna, potassium chloride and hydrogen peroxide with natural sunlight
  • Laser designs now available in both horn and bone
COROZO Corozo-1 Corozo-2
  • Corozo (also called tagua and vegetable ivory) is the nut of a rainforest palm tree
  • Only environmentally sound low-impact dyes used
  • OWB original licensee of Conservation International's Tagua Initiative™, beginning in 1995
  • 27,000,000 acres of vital rainforest are lost each year to deforestation
  • Harvesting and processing corozo prevents deforestation while employing tens of thousands of the indigenous rainforest population
  • Laser designs now available in both hand and machine made corozo
WOOD Wood-1 Wood-2
  • No trees are cut or destroyed for our wood products
  • OWB Rainforest Alliance certified woods are harvested from a coffee plantation using sustainable practices for three generations
  • Other sustainable woods are found on the rainforest floor or are pruned from fruit trees
  • Wood is treated only with linseed oil, extracted from flax seed and naturally water-resistant
BEADED Beaded-1 Beaded-2
  • Beaded buttons are made with the finest quality Czech and Japanese beads
  • Guatemalan beaders are inspired by their beaded embroidered traditional huipiles, blouses worn by traditional Mayan women
  • Nepali beading expertise derives from pote bead jewelry, worn by all married Nepali Hindi women
BAMBOO & COCONUT Bamboo-1 Bamboo-2
  • The fastest growing plant on Earth, bamboo is the world's most renewable resource
  • Bamboo is carved or smoked for our button designs
  • Using coconut husks prevents landfill waste and smoke pollution from waste burning
  • Coconut is carved, polished or left in its natural state for buttons
METAL Metal-1 Metal-2
  • All OWB metal products are nickel-free to European standards (no more than 0.05% nickel)
  • Metal items are available in white metal, brass, copper and burnished "antique" finish
  • Our metal artisans carry on the skills of generations of Newari craftsmanship
RECYCLED GLASS Glass-1 Glass-2
  • Translucent buttons are made from crushed recycled bottles and plates
  • Pigmented buttons use powdered clear glass mixed with ceramic pigments for complete color distribution
  • High-temperature firing anneals recycled glass to a strength greater than ceramics
  • May be machine washed by turning garments inside out. Line dry.
  • Produced in Ghana, where Krobe glass beadmaking dates to the mid-1600s.