by Lori Zimmer,

The small city of Kaunas, Lithuania has been treated to a gorgeousgreen Xmas tree made from 40,000 recycled plastic bottles for Christmas this year. The city commissioned artist Jolanta Šmidtienė to create a glowing installation to be placed in front of the city hall. Made almost entirely from plastic bottles and zip ties, the light-up tree is both festive and eco-friendly!

For the past three years, Jolanta Šmidtienė has been designing the holiday décor for Kaunas. This year, the city was faced with an extremely restrained budget. They sought to create a recycled tree of some sort that would be beautiful without breaking the bank.

The resulting eco tree is quite the spectacle for the public to gather around. Standing 42 feet high, it is lit from the inside, creating a green glow that fills the town square. Šmidtienė created the tree by arranging giant orbs that decrease in size as the tree grows taller. The thousands of green bottles are placed with the nozzles facing out, and then fixed into place with the zip ties. The largest orbs, which sit on the ground, are over five feet in diameter!

The town of Kaunas’s recycled eco-friendly Christmas tree delights its residents, while also saving the environment. We only hope that the tree is lit with energy-efficient LED lights!

(Source: www.inhabitat.com )