Lily Cole is one of the world’s most famous models as well as an actress and environmental campaigner. Now, Lily has entered the world of jewelry design working with the Sky Rainforest Rescue campaign, a project created by broadcaster Sky and the environmental charity World Wildlife Fund to help save the Amazon rainforest.
Cole’s latest brainwave was to support the production of natural rubber, a material which can help make some of the oldest trees in the rainforest more valuable alive than dead. The 25-year-old, who was educated at the prestigious Cambridge University, has created a new jewelry collection which uses the ancient material in a number of different forms including chunky rings, double necklaces and earrings.
A three-and-a-half minute video (below) sees Lily in Acre, northwest Brazil, exploring traditional rubber tapping techniques: “One of the reasons I was excited to join this campaign was to explore the rubber industry as a vehicle for green economics, which, if scaled, I see as offering real hope to the rainforest. Visiting the rubber tappers and their families really inspired me, and I wanted to find a way to bring their story back to Britain,” said Cole.
She’s hopeful that the pieces will help promote the value of the material: “this jewelry collection is just one example of how wild rubber can be used. However, if in the future the value of wild rubber can exceed what can be made from products that cause deforestation, then there is real potential for a sustainable green economy.”
