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Our Partnership With Downward Duck & Our New Yoga Blocks!

Our Partnership With Downward Duck & Our New Yoga Blocks!

If you’re into sustainability and eco-conscious living, you will definitely want to hear about our new partnership with Downward Duck. In case you’ve never heard of them before, Downward Duck is a beautiful charity that works with Ocean Sole Africa in Kenya to create fun yoga blocks out of upcycled materials. Their mission is to create inspiring art pieces from upcycled flip-flops that are polluted in oceans all over the world. A very sustainable way to create yoga blocks and besides that, it creates employment opportunities in high-impact areas. If you want to contribute to a better world, the yoga blocks by Downward Duck are definitely a way to do this. 

How are the Downward Duck yoga blocks created?

You might not expect this when you first lay eyes on the yoga blocks that Downward Duck has made, but they are actually made from flip-flops that have ended up in rivers and oceans. Around the world, a grand total of 3.5 billion people wear flip-flops, in particular in developing countries, as it is a cheap form of footwear. However, they are not very durable in use and this combined with underdeveloped waste processing systems has caused the flip-flops to end up in rivers, oceans or on beaches.   

Downward Duck

The lovely people that work with Downward Duck not only collect flip-flops that have been discarded into the ocean but turn them into beautiful art in the form of yoga blocks. The yoga blocks have been handcrafted by Kenyan women which makes each block completely unique. The money that has been made from the yoga blocks goes directly to their communities, which means you can contribute directly. You will help to restore beaches and oceans while also providing important work opportunities in Kenya.   

Hand-crafted yoga blocks

As the yoga blocks are hand-crafted by Kenyan women, no two blocks will look the same. The yoga blocks are in a monochrome black, white and grey block print. As Downward Duck generally uses bright coloured flip-flops when creating yoga blocks, this means that a lot of black flip-flops go to waste. The yoga blocks that have been created for Yogi Bare mainly use black, grey and white flip-flops which means even less waste will be made.

 

Every day, each female Kenyan artist can make two yoga blocks on average. This only includes the creation part, but before that can happen, the flip-flops have to be collected and washed first. For each yoga block, between 15 and 21 flip-flops are used. Besides flip-flops, recycled Styrofoam is used as well, of which Downward Duck aims to recycle 1 tonne a month.

Contribute to a better environment

With the simple task of buying a yoga block by Downward Duck, you contribute to a better environment and a steady income for people in Kenya. Even though it might not seem like buying one yoga block helps that much, you will help to save 21 flip-flops from landfill and give a woman in Kenya the opportunity to do meaningful work to provide for her children. Besides that, 10% of Ocean Sole Africa's revenue goes towards marine conservation programs which also contribute to cleaner oceans.

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