Photo by Brandon Sullivan Jill Helms looks at her reflection in a rectangular mirror she designed featuring square pieces of soda cans placed on the diagonal.

“I don’t even drink soda myself,” Jill Helms says with a laugh. Yet, she became fascinated with the pop-art appeal of cans and recently found a way to repurpose them into frames for mirrors. After attending a class where she learned how to make decorative plant stakes out of discarded aluminum cans, Helms realized that working with the metal was not as tricky as she had imagined. She immediately began experimenting and created a mural of recycled cans for her hallway. “I didn’t have a plan to make anything else,” the Mesa, Arizona, resident states. But her two sons and their friends pleaded with her to craft something for them, too. And that is how the mirror frames came about.

Helms—a former graphic designer—works part time as a special-education aide at a local high school, and collects cans from her students as well as from family and friends. She spends afternoons rinsing and cutting up the bounty in a small workshop in her garage. Using scissors, she removes the cans’ tops and bottoms and then sorts through them to find 1-inch-square segments that “look good design-wise.” Helms attaches the pieces to a mirror frame with nails; this technique causes the metal to ripple and reflect light, she explains. Unlike toxic glue, the nails do not harm indoor air quality or the environment. Keeping with her eco-friendly approach, Helms turns leftover scraps into flower-shaped earrings.

A close-up of one of Helms’ 9 1/2-inch-square mirrors

The colors of the frames depend on the beverage cans she incorporates into the designs. In regard to her customers’ preferences, “They want to look for whatever they normally drink,” says the artist, pointing out that Diet Coke is the most popular brand. For her latest project—a large mirror featuring a lively koi pattern—Socko Energy cans came in handy, as she cut out the C’s to function as eyes for the fish. Helms mentions that a large mirror with a blackbird motif is next on her agenda, and says she wants to keep “thinking outside of the box.”

This celebration of creativity seems to be a driving force in Helms’ life. After working as a graphic designer for 16 years, she began painting children’s furniture and then started her own mural business. Until she got hooked crafting recycled can mirrors, the Arizona Artists Guild member’s spare moments were spent creating fine-art paintings for local galleries. Her garden, which features numerous homemade whimsical and eco-conscious pieces, further attests to her artistic spirit.