If you’ve visited the Academy’s exhibit on climate change, you may have seen a wall labeled “Share Your Ideas,” where visitors can post their thoughts on how to lessen their impact on the environment (if you haven’t seen it, it’s pictured below, left). In search of a more sustainable source for the tags on the wall, our creative services department and our printer Paragraphics came up with a great solution: re-using make-readies.

What’s a make-ready, you ask? It’s the paper that goes through the press to perfect the ink coverage and colors for a print job. Paper often goes through the press several times before being recycled, and the effect is interesting layers of text and graphics on one side. The other side is blank for writing on. Paragraphics has offered the Academy free use of their make-readies, and they even trimmed and punched the paper to fit the current specs of the posting board. Kudos to those who put this creative, sustainable idea into practice!