Ανακύκλωση με Νόημα
Ξύλο, μέταλλο και ύφασμα παίρνουν δεύτερη ζωή αντί να καταλήγουν στα σκουπίδια.
We give Second Life to Materials
Zizania was born from a simple, stubborn idea: that nothing is ever truly useless.
Every piece we create starts with something we found. We don’t buy materials. We gather what the world has decided has no more value: old planks, iron scraps, threads, metals, things that look broken or beyond repair. That’s where our work begins. Because we believe value doesn’t disappear it just changes shape.
Αλληλεγγύη & Συνεργασία
Λειτουργούμε ως ΚοινΣΕπ, στηρίζοντας ευάλωτες ομάδες και την τοπική κοινότητα.
Χειροποίητη Δημιουργία
Κάθε αντικείμενο σχεδιάζεται και κατασκευάζεται με το χέρι — μοναδικό, όπως εσύ.
From Asomatos to Mytilene
Our story begins in Asomatos, a mountain village on Lesvos with few opportunities for work or community life. There, from 2021 to 2023, we ran a self-managed café called “Kanenas Monos” (“Nobody Alone”) — a gathering place built on solidarity and creative expression. It taught us that collaboration and self-organisation can breathe life into even the places that seem forgotten.
After two years of this work, the initiative matured. We founded the Social Cooperative Enterprise “Zizania” and moved our base to Mytilene, to take advantage of what an urban environment offers — without losing the spark that brought us here.
Why "Zizania"
The name is no accident. “Zizania” means weeds — what is left over, what is overlooked, what is considered unwanted. And yet, weeds can transform, bloom, and give meaning. That’s how we see the materials that pass through our hands: wood, metal, fabric, glass, plastic — pieces of old objects that would otherwise end up as waste. We give them a second life.
We make handcrafted objects: small furniture pieces, lighting, decorative items, jewellery, and toys. Every piece is one of a kind, carrying traces of its previous lives, crafted with care, imagination, and respect for the story of each material.
Our philosophy is simple: we turn the “useless” into something functional and beautiful. Not as a technical exercise, but as a political act — a statement against a culture of disposal.
A Network, Not a Shop
Zizania isn’t just the members of our cooperative. We collaborate with independent makers working in reuse and sustainable craft, exchanging materials, techniques, and stories. Our ambition is to become a platform that supports and amplifies the work of people who treat their materials and the environment with care — shaping a network of handmade creativity rooted in the circular economy.
THE COLLECTIVE
Our Cooperative
Artist
Artist & Head of Educational Programs
Gioula Koutsoubou
Every material we throw away is a story that hasn't ended yet.
Yioula Koutsoubou is an artist and environmental educator with a background in agronomy, working at the intersection of ecology, art, and social change. Using creative upcycling as a form of resistance, she transforms discarded materials into art that challenges wasteful systems and dominant patterns of consumption. Since 2010, she has led workshops and public projects with diverse communities, promoting sustainability, collective action, and more self-sufficient ways of living.
Artist
Woodworker & Object Designer
Mees Hehenkamp
Every material has its own memory — wood, clay, straw. Our job is to listen to them.
Mees enjoys gardening and working outdoors, continuously drawing inspiration from the natural environment. As an architect, he works across architecture, construction, and crafting, with a focus on natural materials and low-impact building.
In Lesvos, he has renovated homes for refugee families while sharing practical building skills. His experience includes constructing houses in France using local wood, clay, and straw, and improving the energy efficiency of homes in the Netherlands.
Within the KOINSEP, he designs and builds woodcraft from reclaimed materials — both original pieces and custom-made objects. He also contributes to the design and realization of site-specific architectural and construction projects.
Head of Social Kitchen & Community Outreach
Mary Almazidou
We gather the 'useless' fragments of everyday life and give them a second chance, transforming them into art that blooms against the expected.
Mary's journey weaves together rhythm, flavor, and giving back. After 30 years in music, her search for a life in harmony with nature led her into the world of organic food and solidarity.
The journey continued back to the roots of Lesvos. In Asomatos, with the KOINSEP "Nobody Alone", she became part of an embrace gathered around the social kitchen and the old village festivals, breathing new life into the traditional watermill and the memories of the land.
Today, her need to connect with the pulse of Mytilene gave birth to the KOINSEP "Zizania". There, guided by creativity, they gather the "useless" fragments of everyday life and give them a second chance, transforming them into art that blooms against the expected.
Head of Self-Sufficiency & Collective Organization
Giorgos Kairis
After a 20-year Odyssey, I finally returned to my Ithaca — to offer what I learned along the way.
Giorgos was born in Mytilene, on the island of Lesvos. He spent the first 26 years of his life on the island, engaging in a wide range of pursuits. After a 20-year "Odyssey", he finally returned to his "Ithaca" with the aim of offering the knowledge and experience he had gathered around self-sufficiency and self-organization.
His encounter with the people of "Zizania" sparked in him the need to share his concerns, to question, and to try to envision a new world of coexistence, cooperation, and solidarity.
Today, as a member of the KOINSEP "Zizania", his goal is to actively contribute to building structures that foster collective action and autonomy, turning the experience of past years into practical offering for his homeland.
PARTNERS
Collaborating Artists
Artist
Collaborator
Katerina Prokopiou
Cyanotype is not just a technique, it's a way of letting light write the story.
Katerina Prokopiou is a visual artist and educator based in Cyprus, specialising in cyanotype, one of the oldest photographic processes dating back to the 19th century. Through experiential workshops and community-based projects, she uses art as a tool to advocate for human dignity and environmental justice. Her work meets Zizania's vision at its core: art is not a luxury, but an act of resistance and connection with the world.