By Marla Hoffman - Feb 21, 2008
If one man’s trash is another man’s treasure, Hamden resident Joe DeRisi has an unending source for his business turning salvage into salable products.
He takes unwanted wood products, antiques, cast iron radiators and all variety of household items and resells them for practical and creative reuse.
DeRisi founded Urbanminers LLC as a result of his long lived desire to preserve the past and reduce the amount of waste that comes from demolition.
His journey into salvage and recycling began as a child, when he spent a lot of time at flee markets with his grandfather. He remembers selling old things that no one wanted and making money from them.
As he got older, DeRisi entered the construction and renovation business.
“I came to really appreciate the workmanship in old buildings,” he said. “At the end of the day I would take discarded items like doors and furniture and store them.
“Eventually I began to sell them out of my garage. I’ve always kept a side business salvaging,” he said.
His business today salvages items like doors, cabinets, lumber, floor boards, crown molding, vintage tables and chairs, mantels, plates and dishes, office desks, radiators, light fixtures, rugs, vinyl replacement windows and even a personal collection of colored glass bottles.
Most of the items he stores at his two locations in Hamden and Wallingford are for resale although he said he is taking in more objects at a faster rate than are going out.
He sells most items as-is because he doesn’t do a lot of restoration. He will, however, paint objects on request. One set of aluminum cabinets sits in the show room drying from a recent paint job. Mostly, he said, he likes to sell an item the way it comes in to preserve its original qualities.
DeRisi also takes in items that people drop off if they are in sellable condition. “Folks come in all the time,” he said. “Most of the things they bring in are because they are moving and can’t take it with them but don’t want to end up in the trash. If it is sellable we’ll take it.”
DeRisi also gets requests to clean up attics and remove salvageable items. For this there is a service charge. He has done work at Yale University and other colleges. Large antique pocket doors that were found in a wall during a renovation at Yale lean gracefully yet imposingly against a wall at DeRisi’s shop.
Cast iron radiators are popular, he said. One university job produced about seven tons of radiators, all of which can be refurbished and reused, a good selling point for DeRisi.
Preserving the past
DeRisi has developed a passion for preserving the unique qualities of an old house. From the floor boards to the crown molding, from the tub to the kitchen sink, when DeRisi goes into an old house, he sees a physical piece of history. His mission: Salvage what he can.
DeRisi also deconstructs houses. Different from demolition, deconstruction involves taking apart the house in the exact opposite way it was constructed rather than taking a wrecking ball to it. Deconstruction allows DeRisi to take unwanted items from the house and resell them.
Deconstruction begins with the shingles and rafters, then the flooring, working his way down, he said.
Salvageable floor boards or other wooden item are de-nailed and stacked. Sometimes DeRisi sells these items on site, wholesaling them out, and other times he drops them off at the buyer’s location.
Financially, it is less expensive to demolish a building, he said. Sentimentally, however, the value of deconstruction is worth it, he said.
“An owner of a house I deconstructed saved the flooring,” DeRisi said, “so that they could use it in their new house. It saved them money, and it added an antique quality to the new house as well.
“In conventional demolition,” he said, “all or most materials will be wasted. In a typical house, 85 percent, at least, can be reused.”
According to DeRisi, his method of deconstruction prevents waste and will possibly preserve antiques that otherwise are irreplaceable.
“Considering the quality of the wood of a piece of flooring,” he said, “and then thinking about it being demolished — you’re throwing away something that is two or 300 years old.”
Environmentally, salvaging a house prevents unnecessary waste. Monetarily, it helps the economy by providing jobs.
DeRisi has been pushing for increased use of the deconstruction method locally and at the state level. Eventually he decided to do it himself. Urbanminers LLC opened in December 2007.
DeRisi also is Watershed Coordinator for the Norwalk River Watershed Initiative and spent six years as an environmental analyst with the Southwest Conservation District. He received the 2007 Outstanding Citizen Conservationist of the Year Certificate of Achievement from the Southwest Conservation District.
Items are available for purchase in the showroom at 39 Oregon Ave. For more information about Urbanminers LLC, visit urbanminers.com.
