If you love the feeling and appearance of beautiful velvet, you might wonder if it’s really eco-friendly. The question is tricky! Here’s what you need to know about velvet and if you should purchase velvet clothing or décor items in future.

How Velvet Is Made

Velvet is not a fabric on its own – it’s traditionally made from silk. This makes the question of velvet’s sustainability complicated because silk has pros and cons. It might provide incomes for marginalized workers who grow the silkworms from which silk is gained, but it involves animal cruelty. Traditionally, the use of silk involves the taking of threads of silk from the cocoon of silkworms during their pupa stage. This reduces the silkworm’s lifespan. Silkworm cocoons are then put into boiling water that kills the pupa so that the silk threads remain intact and undamaged.

How To Make Velvet More Eco-Friendly

To make velvet more sustainable, you should follow some important green tips when buying velvet items.

• Choose a good source. Make sure the velvet items you’re interested in purchasing have been ethically sourced. Silk can be ethically sourced. This silk is known as “peace silk” because it involves a much more humane treatment of silkworms. Fibres are taken after the silkworm has emerged from its cocoon, instead of killing it.
• Skip polyester. Sometimes velvet is made from other sources, such as polyester. This isn’t sustainable. Polyester isn’t biodegradable, so it’s very cruel to the environment. It takes between 20 and 200 years to decompose once it’s put into a landmine! However, things look up if the polyester has been made in a greener way. An example is if the polyester is made from recycled plastic. So, avoid synthetic materials that haven’t made use of recycling or eco-friendly materials.

Velvet is a beautiful, trendy, and luxurious material. But it can be unhealthy for the planet. By buying it more responsibly and ensuring it’s ethically sourced, you can enjoy velvet without the guilt.

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Deep, bold colours are becoming the new neutrals. They’re great at creating an interesting and rich atmosphere in your home, while working well with soft and comforting textures in winter. Here’s how to decorate your home with jewel tones so you create magic, not chaos.

Don’t Be Afraid To Mix And Match

Lots of jewel tones in your décor pieces and accessories can be magical when teamed together. However, you should also strive to choose pieces that have different textures – think soft, rough, shiny – to create a great blend. Since dark jewel tones are so sensual, you should add an element of touch to complete the effect. This is also great in winter when you want comfort in your surroundings.

Embrace Dark Furniture

If you have dark jewel tones on the wall and/or in accessories, you want to bring in a wash of dark colour, such as black, to the mix. Why? This serves to highlight the beauty of the jewel tones in the room. Just think of how gorgeous pink and aquamarine can be against black, for instance.

Switch Your Neutral Paint Color For Jewels

Don’t be afraid to wash your walls in jewel colours instead of the tried-and-tested neutrals. Whether it’s garnet, amethyst, or sapphire, jewel tones add depth and glamour to your home.

Build A Jewel Box

Gemstone colours create drama, but you don’t have to commit to them in large spaces. You can create what’s known as a jewel box, which is a small space that uses rich colours. A good tip to fall back on is that a spacious room shouldn’t be as filled with colour as a smaller one. Some great small places where you can create a jewel box include an accent wall, closet, nooks, window seats, and more! Dare to dream in bold colours.

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Darker tones of wood are in this year, especially when it comes to flooring, so here’s a guide to getting the look right and sustainably sourced when decorating or renovating your home.

Use Wood In High-Traffic Areas

Dark wood is highly durable, which makes it a sustainable and practical choice for any areas of the home where people usually congregate, such as the living room or kitchen.

Balance Wood With Light

Although dark brown wooden floors can be stylish, their dark color can be a tad overwhelming. They can also make small spaces even smaller, so you need to combine them with lighter décor accents to uplift them. Colors that work well with dark wood include pastels and grey, to create an especially chic atmosphere.

Throw In Color

If you have a piece of dark wood furniture, you might think that you should try to decorate the rest of the room in a minimal way when it comes to the colors you use, such as by choosing neutrals. But you don’t have to. In fact, placing the armoire or table under a vibrant painting or in front of a neon accent wall can be the perfect way to enliven it. The same goes for teaming up dark wood furniture with interesting fabric patterns, such as an animal-print rug.

Make It Sustainable

You want to be sure that the wood products you’re buying for your home have been responsibly forested. In Australia, three types of forestry certification schemes are a must to check for so that you know where the wood came from. It also helps to choose the most sustainable types of wood. Generally, these include mahogany, teak, and bamboo.

Blend Different Wood Tones

If you have more than one type of wood in a room, these can work beautifully together. This is also a good way in which to upcycle wooden pieces that you already have instead of throwing them out. A décor tip when using more than one type of wood is to choose one wood for the flooring and another for the furniture. Making other décor items, such as bright sofa cushions or pretty dining room chairs, the highlight of the room also works to create a streamlined effect, helping the tones of wood to blend in beautifully.

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Is plastic still a huge part of your household? It’s time to change that. One of the things that might make you hesitate is the idea that removing all the plastic in your home, from shopping bags to bottles and everything in-between, will involve lots of hard work and adjustment. This isn’t always easy to do, especially with your hectic lifestyle. But every bit you do helps! Here are five easy and stress-free ways to cut down on your plastic usage.

BYOB – Bring Your Own Bag

You probably have lots of large shopper bags or boxes lying around the house that you could use when you go grocery shopping, so there’s really no reason to purchase plastic bags at the store. Always forget to bring them? Pack them in the boot of your car so that you’re never left empty-handed.

Plastic Free

There are some plastic items that are really unnecessary, like plastic straws you’re given at restaurants with your kids’ milkshakes, or plastic used to wrap a new vase you’ve bought at the furniture store. Instead of taking these home where you’ll have to throw them out, avoid getting them in the first place. Same goes for things like plastic lunch boxes – rather get into the habit of using glass or steel containers, or wrapping sandwiches in reusable food wraps.

Buy Items In Bulk

When it comes to those items that you always need around the house, like toilet paper and your kids’ favorite cereal, buy them in bulk. Not only will this save you money, but it’ll also prevent you from using too much plastic.

Don’t Buy Bottled Water

A plastic water bottle takes 450 years to disintegrate. That’s a scary statistic and easily avoidable. Buy a glass bottle you can carry around with you. Not only will the water taste better in glass, but it’ll last you a long time and it won’t contain chemicals that are found in plastic water bottles, such as BPA that can disrupt your body’s hormones.

Limit Processed Foods

Treating your family to junk food might be fun, but processed food always makes use of lots of plastic when it comes to its packaging. Try to enjoy healthier home-cooked meals that won’t require plastic trays, plastic wrap, and all that cardboard that ends up in the bin.

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Camping during the winter months might seem like a silly idea – who wants to be shivering during the entire holiday? But often, winter camping is exciting and fun! The key is to stay warm so that you don’t have to feel miserable and can enjoy the beautiful frosty sights and activities. Here are some important tips.

Boost Your Clothing Layers

You layer your clothes during winter anyway, but take this up a notch if you’ll be camping. Get some base layers of clothing, such as wool, and then put another insulating layer on top. Make sure you cover your extremities, as well as your head and neck. Always keep an extra pair of dry, clean socks handy for night time so that you can wear them to bed and stay warm.

Remember To Bring A Tarp

A tarp that you can set underneath your tent at night is one of the most important things to bring on your winter camping trip. It’s valuable because it prevents any moisture from sneaking into your tent, so it makes camping in beautiful but rainy destinations a dream.

Go Sleeping Bag Hunting

Sleeping bags definitely don’t come standard. If you’re going to be camping in a cold location, you need to purchase a sleeping bag that’s rated for that level of cold. Basically, Season 1 and 2 sleeping bags are generally suitable for camping in summer, so give them a skip. You’ll need a Season 3 or 4 sleeping bag as they have better insulation for temperatures that are below zero. If you’re going to an extremely cold place, such as on a mountain, you’ll need a Season 5 bag.

Choose The Right Campsite

If you’re going to be camping at a designated site, make sure you place your tent in the best place. This means avoiding any windy areas, such as valleys. Set up your tent among the trees as these can protect you from wind and chill. Just make sure they look strong so that you don’t have to risk falling branches from extreme wind.

Eat Warm Foods

Not only is it comforting to eat hot, delicious foods during cold weather, but it’s also a good way to stay warm. You need to boost your calorie intake, so choose high-protein foods, as well as carbs like bread and oatmeal. Eating a snack late at night before bedtime might not be good at home but it’s important on a winter camping trip. It forces your body to generate heat throughout the cold night. Don’t forget to drink lots of water – it helps your body to generate more heat and prevents dehydration.

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If you’re thinking of buying flowers for your mom or friends this Mother’s Day, it might be better to buy them something else. Fresh flowers aren’t a green choice. Although they’re beautiful and really brighten up a room, they have a not-so-pretty impact on the environment. Here’s what you need to know about them.

They Gobble Up Pesticides

Flowers are sprayed with lots of pesticides to prevent insects from destroying them while they grow. Scarily, flowers don’t follow the same rules for pesticides as edible crops do. That means loads of pesticides can be used on them without anyone raising an eyebrow. The cut flower industry is a huge consumer of pesticides on a global scale.

They Might Not Be Locally Produced

Often, flowers you buy from the shop are actually transported from elsewhere in the world. In fact, 78 percent of cut flowers that are bought in the United States are actually imported from countries such as Ecuador where the weather is warm and flowers can grow beautifully all year round. It takes a lot of carbon dioxide to transport those flowers to you.

They Really Don’t Last

In 2017, Australia imported over five million rose stems from Kenya for Valentine’s Day. Is all that carbon emission worth it? Not at all. If you’re lucky, those pretty roses will last a few days or a week, but then they’ll start to die. When you throw them into the bin, they’ll end up in a landfill. During decay, the flowers will release methane, a powerful greenhouse gas.

They’re Smothered In Plastic

Pretty bouquets are often covered in cellophane. Although it’s considered to be a bit better for the environment than other plastics, there are many dangers associated with cellophane. This plastic is produced by dissolving plant fiber in a mixture of alkali and carbon disulfide. Then, a sulfuric acid and sodium sulfate blend are added. Further chemicals are used, such as glycerol and nitrocellulose and wax. There are many unhealthy toxins that are involved in this production process, and they have negative effects for our health. For instance, they can affect the nervous system. That’s definitely not the kind of gift you want to spoil your loved ones with!

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