Do you keep company with a person who smokes cigars? Put them on the scale, cigar vs. sweetheart, and the sweetheart would most certainly win. So you might as well make lemonade and make use of the cigar bands. In particular, the bands from Cuban cigars are sought-after because they are so hard to come by. And, like other such advertising labels, they are beautiful.

How can you recycle these bands? Think collage. Think decoupage. As your smoker unwraps his stogy, request that he please remove the band carefully and save it for you. When you have a good number of these bands, you can begin to think about a good place to display them. If you are impatient and want a quick project, put them into a picture frame. Purchase a chunk of foam board. Paint it a color that will set off the colors found on the bands. Then place the collage in a frame that shows off the beauty of the bands.

This collage idea can be enhanced and beautified if you take the project to the next level and create a shadow box. A framing store can make you a custom shadow box, but this choice can be expensive. Your project can cost less if you use a ready-made shadow box frame. Of course, when you buy a ready-made frame, you need to fit the contents into the area of the frame rather than fitting the frame around the contents. This is relatively easy with something as small as cigarbands. As you plan your shadow box, think of other small objects that fit in with this smoking motif. Consider match books, color-coordinated ribbons, wine corks, and postcards or other pictures that illustrate in Cuba.

If you want a larger, more impressive project, try decoupaging the cigarbands on a small table or coffee table. Mod Podge is a product that has been around for forty years. It makes it easy to arrange the bands on the top of the table, glue them down, and apply the Mod Podge. When the collage is this large, you might want to add more than just cigarbands. Wine labels would make a natural partner. It’s probable that the person who enjoys the big brown smoke also enjoys a glass of fine wine. Wine labels have a beauty of their own that complements the beauty of the cigarband. And if you are an adventurous wine drinker, you can quickly accumulate a collection of highly varied wine labels.

As your collection of bands and labels accumulates, you can take the display to the highest level: the family room wall. Yes, you can glue your bands and labels to your wall. The effect is more successful if the room has a chair rail. It is best to put the labels above the rail on a single wall so that it doesn’t become overpowering. But think of how unique your room will be when it displays the artful cigarbands and wine labels.