Sustainability at Sorelle: Amazon Rainforest Day and Prioritizing the Planet

Our team specializes in art because we believe it makes a positive impact on people and the spaces where they spend their time. And while the idea of "impact" is one we know well in the context of art, everyone has lately become aware of the ways in which the little things we do in everyday life can create a lot of negative impact - namely for the planet. 

Producing and shipping any item nationally and globally affects the environment, and even as a small business, we have a part in that. So we've put together a new Sustainability Initiative so that we continue to prioritize the planet alongside the arts, and empower our clients to shop sustainably. 

To kick off our new efforts, we're celebrating World Amazon Day on September 5, 2021 by donating to have 250 trees planted in the Amazon Rainforest. But that's just the beginning! Read on to learn more about new and existing steps we're taking toward creating a more sustainable future. 

For every artwork purchased, Sorelle plants a tree. 

We recognize that the artwork we sell uses materials like wood stretcher bars, cotton canvas, and disposable tubes of paint, in order to be created. To try and offset the effects of using these materials, Sorelle is partnering with One Tree Planted and will plant one tree for every artwork purchased - no matter the value. Over 17% of the Amazon Rainforest has been destroyed, so for the next year, all donated trees will be planted in the Amazon. We'll rotate our planting location every year - so we spread the love over time, while helping to restore ecosystems and sequester carbon from the atmosphere.

Open and Limited Edition prints are produced on demand. 

You may have noticed that we don't carry prints in-store, and offer customized framing options when shopping for prints online. This is because each print is produced when you purchase. What does this mean for the planet? It means we don't unnecessarily produce or carry print products, thereby preventing excess waste. When a client decides to purchase a print, they select their printing specifications, and our partnering print vendor produces and ships to their destination directly. 

A large portion of our print orders ship within the continental United States, which means that shipping distances between the client and our U.S.-based vendor are kept low. For print orders we fulfill outside the United States, we work with partnering vendors which are closer to the shipping destination - another way to keep air miles down. We may not be local to everyone, but we try to get it as close as we can. 

Clients can offset their order's carbon. 

Buying online is a fantastic option for a ton of reasons - particularly in the last eighteen months. But it's now relatively common knowledge that shipping those orders releases carbon emissions. To try and combat this, Sorelle is offering clients the option to pay a small additional fee at checkout to help offset some of the carbon emissions produced by their order. Simply add your item to cart, click the checkbox to pay the additional fee, and you're done! Your added fee will go toward the sustainability project closest to your shipping destination. 

We work with our artists. 

Obviously, we're an art gallery, so it's our talented artists who are actually creating the collection of artwork we sell. In the coming months, we plan to showcase our artists who are taking steps to prioritize sustainable practices in their studios in a new blog series. We think it's interesting, of course, but we also hope talking about this type of effort will help artists to employ similarly sustainable methods in their own studios. Moreover, the beauty of a product like artwork is that if a painting or sculpture doesn't sell in our gallery, it doesn't end up in a landfill - we ship it back to the artist, some of whom even create a new painting over-top to reuse the canvas! So stay tuned for our first talk with artist Ned Martin, about his use of recycled aluminum in his artwork and more, coming soon. 

While we feel like we've just made some pretty big strides in our new mission, we should also say, this is just the beginning. We are always growing, and the ways we try to help the planet are no exception to that rule. They say, "The Earth without Art is just 'Eh,'" but it seems to us that art without the earth would be a whole lot worse. 

For questions regarding our sustainability mission and practices, please contact us. 

Find out more about deforestation on National Geographic. 
Featured photo by One Tree Planted.