My husband is a silly man who often claims, when I ask him a question, that I am “grilling him like a salmon.” But he is a good sport. After all, he married me, didn’t he? So when we were in Pittsburgh last year for the opening of Into The Forest, he agreed when I told him I needed to make a stop at the Construction Junction. He even opened the door for me!
The Construction Junction is a nonprofit used and surplus building material retailer. It accepts all kinds of donations-construction materials, old appliances, electrical supplies, plumbing supplies, tools, lighting, building materials and many other things too numerous to mention. This keeps stuff out of landfills and gives it a second life when it leaves in the hands of a customer to be used in a new project.
But the construction junction is also a mecca for creative types. I found some embossed tiles there that make perfect polymer clay texture sheets. I got some brass pipe and metal parts that I will recycle into jewelry. If I wanted one of the vintage stoves that seem to be all the rage these days, I could pick one up at the Construction Junction and restore it to working order.
The place is HUGE, the staff is friendly and there is plenty of parking. Check it out if you find yourself in Pittsburgh.
Ornamento 
It is a great place! Many of the materials for Into the Forest came from Construction Junction and its sister Pittsburgh Center for Creative Reuse http://pccr.org
I visited the Center for Creative Reuse too. A blog post on that visit is forthcoming.
These places sound fabulous, but I live in Arizona and can’t really go there. Do you know of similar places in other locations? I know there is one in Berkeley, CA, but that’s all. Thank So!
We have the Resource Exchange in Philadelphia but that’s even farther from you than Pittsburgh! I tried googling your question and got http://www.lancastercreativereuse.org/directory-creative-reuse-centers.html. Check it out!