Colleen Lappe Jewelry strives to make ethical, sustainable jewelry.

That means each piece is handmade using 100% recycled gold. Recycled gold is of equal quality to mined gold but better for the environment because no part of the earth is newly mined to retrieve it. Recycled gold only uses gold form circulating items such as outdated jewelry and electronics. Due to the fact that gold is often illegally mined in the rainforest using high pressure water and mercury to extract it (which destroys the surrounding environment and the lives of everyone who drinks the water), it’s good practice to use recycled gold in an effort to stop feeding illegal mining business.

Now for ethically sourced/conflict free stones. Stones get the title of ethically sourced or conflict free when the stone does not put anyone along the supply chain into unsafe conditions to retrieve them. No children or slaves are used to mine or cut any of the gemstones that have the ethically sourced label. Ethically sourced stones cost slightly more since the laborers are given a fair wage. It also means that practices are put in place to mine for the stones with as minimal harm to the environment as possible. We like that too.