Top designer Barbara de Vries wants to raise awareness of ocean pollution - one unique necklace at at time.

Barbara de Vries says she thinks of herself as a recycler, but I call her a visionary. While walking on her favorite Bahamian beach one day, she came up with the idea to re-purpose all the ugly plastic that was cluttering the beautiful ocean she loved so much. So she started It's A Man Made World, a jewelry company that uses discarded ocean plastic to create lovely, wearable art.

De Vries career started 30 years ago with a modeling contract, but by the 1980s, she had her own collection which sold in stores like Neiman Marcus, and was also designing for the likes of Calvin Klein and other top names in New York.

But after trying to clean up her local beach proved a daunting task, she decided to design a jewelry line that would put the ocean trash to good use.

After years of floating around in salt water, the plastic takes on new shapes and colors, says De Vries. "The shapes and colors inspire me into giving them a second life as a pair of earrings, a bracelet or a necklace. Each piece evolves from it's original shape..." she says.

After years of washing around the seas, each piece of discarded plastic takes on a new dimension, mimicking nature and taking on characteristic of stone and coral. Each piece gains a beautiful and unique patina which De Vries includes when molding the individual pieces.

I love the beachy look and washed out colors of this jewelry, and it's great to know that by wearing something so pretty, I'm helping to raise awareness of the plight of our oceans. A portion of every sale goes to the Cape Eleuthera Institute, an organization based in the Bahamas, which researches resource management and sustainability geared to marine and island life.