Local Harvest Local Food Locator

What a great online widget! When you visitLocalharvest.org you simply enter your zip code and voila, a list of products from farms near you. The have all sorts of foods that you can either order for delivery, pick up at the farm or they'll ship it to you with less footprint than the shipping to Safeway's distribution center, then to your local Safeway branch. Less refrigerated trucks, less of all the bad stuff, and you can support small growers in the process. Check it out, you may learn something about your neighbors. I guess near my home, there's tones of honey makers, almonds, beans, sausages and Emu burgers!!

Viva Terra

Chunky sweaters, luscious wraps and a bunch of accessories for you and the home, Viva Terra offers up something for everyone and all of it is eco friendly. Healthy bedding, recycled glass dinnerware, luxurious robes and scarves. Check out this sustainable shop at Viva Terra

Indigenous Designs Corp

From the Wall Street Journal:

Indigenous Designs Corp. prides itself as a truly green supplier. Its women's clothing is made from all-natural, sustainable materials, such as organic cotton, silk and alpaca. It adheres to strict fair-trade manufacturing practices overseas, runs its U.S. corporate office on solar power and encourages employees to bike to work.

Now that's what I'm talking about! A company that demands a change at every level, from the individual employee, to the office setting and through the production line. What a great example!! To help make their story a success, you can buy their wares at Dillards REI and Whole Foods or visit their website.

Timberland's footprint

Timberland is putting "nutrition" labels on their wares to help consumers understand the impact of their buy choices. They are an outdoor brand and hence they must be committed to environmental stewardship. They are making an effort to reduce their footprint and with such transparency as to set an example for other companies and for their customers. The labels also outline the impact their production has on the local community.

THINKING LIKE AN ECONISTA
This smells like green washing to me.... transparency made to look like they're doing something, when really, it's just a label that we must trust is accurate. Their website claims that they reduced their greenhouse gases by 10%, are using water-based adhesives on 8million shoes and tripled their used of organic cotton ( although you can by only 5 garments made from OC from their site). Plus, they're making tools to measure how they're affecting the environment. This sounds like a decent start, but I'd like to see more about recycled poly fleece, recycled rubber for souls, how about making some stuff on this continent instead of in asia to reduce the carbon footprint.... There are a lot of things that I hope they will do in the near future.

Flocks

I couldn't resist this hand knitted 100% wool rug from Flocks. This company hands knits all of it's garments and knows the exact sheep the wool was sheared from (the photo book shows 4 of the 18 sheep who's wool the rug is made). Since one sheep supplies exactly enough wool for one sweater, each sweater is tagged with a specific animal’s ID number, and comes with a certificate: the animal's passport. Information provided includes breed, weight, year and place of birth, and a picture of the sheep. They currently use undyed, natural colored wools, but they will soon use veg dyes in future collections. This is a wonderful idea, a way of bringing the process of making cloths closer to the consumer. Although their sweaters go for ~$400, what better way to connect with a more traditional way of living, without up and moving (or knitting one yourself).

No Impact Man

My new favorite blog... his name is Colin Beavan :

noimpactman

For one year, my wife, my 2-year-old daughter, my dog and I, while living in the middle of New York City, are attempting to live without making any net impact on the environment. In other words, no trash, no carbon emissions, no toxins in the water, no elevators, no subway, no products in packaging, no plastics, no air conditioning, no TV, no toilets…

And I thought I was doing all I can by changing some light bulbs, taking the train instead of driving, using my canvas bag when shopping and buying local foods... I guess I could go off the deep end, or just read his blog and contemplate taking the leap.

Etsy items inspired by nature

mkwind

seaurchine

jekbot

marrion's shop

misslo

Emmapardos

honeybee

Carole Wang Dragon

Dragon, an eco-friendly line by Carole Wang, doesn't serve up the hippest looks around, but there are a few nice, simple pieces that can complement an econista's wardrobe. Dragon is Wang's response to health issues in her family and degrading environmental conditions. Her summer and fall lines are made from bamboo, but she promises future designs made from soysilk as well. It's worth keeping an eye on this Oakland, CA designer.

Etsy: Squrlgurl's shop

Squrlgurl's designs are wonderfully whimsical and inspired by nature. Viewing her creations feels like a stroll through a french garden. Her sensibility has an old world charm with a fresh, new perspective through calming colors and quality materials.

Lalesso

Lalesso's doesn't seem to be too concerned about trend, their pieces are inspired by their fabrics, by africa and the lifestyle of the girl who wears them. Alice and Olivia, the founders of Lalesso, first met in Cape Town while studying Fashion Design then after hanging out in Kenya, where Olivia lived, the two conceived Lalesso. One of the things the company is commited to is supporting the textile and cotton industries in Kenya, provide jobs and increase the standard of living of their community.

Responsible Shopper

Responsible Shopper is a great resource for those shoppers who want to know more about the mainstream brands they love. The information found on Responsible Shopper gathers information by looking behind the scenes at the production process, checking out annual reports and news headlines. They also note advertising messaging and other controversies that may surround a brand. You can find info for all industries, not just clothing, it's useful and the rest of the Coop America site has a lot of interesting resources.

From their site:
Eddie Bauer, the self-proclaimed "legend in American sportswear," strives to "to give you such outstanding quality, value, service and guarantee that [Eddie Bauer] may be worthy of your high esteem." In some respects, Eddie Bauer has lived up to its mission. It participated in the "Made in New York" campaign to rebuild the apparel industry after September 11, 2001, and it partnered with PETA to ensure fair treatment of animals. The company's fair treatment of workers, however, is still in need of improvement. According to the Fair Labor Association's annual labor report, sweatshop conditions persist and the company continues to source from factories that perpetrate abuse.

Velvet by Graham & Spencer

100% Lyocell

Since discovering that LaROK has been using some of the revolutionary sustainable fabrics like Tencel, Lyocell and Modal, I've been looking around to see what other brands are using them. Velvet by Graham and Spencer is using all three in a number of cute pieces.

100% Micromodal

Where is US energy?

Very interesting interactive map showing where various energy sources originate. Wind, Solar, Bio Mass, Coal Oil, Natural Gas. Our country is rich with resources, we can use them wisely.

safe cosmetics

SafeCosmetics.org is a good hub for some quick and dirty facts and resources about the cosmetics we're using. Here's a sample of their articles:

Lead is now known as the toxic stuff that used to be in gasoline and house paint. So what is this throwback ingredient doing in Grecian Formula hair coloring?

We watch what we eat, we're concerned about air pollution, but we don't know what's in our lipstick (which we "eat" all day). There's information out there to help us look good and make healthy choices.

LaROK sustainable?

I was surfing around Nordstrom's website and did a search for "Made in the USA" and a few really cute pieces by LaROK popped up like this "Playa" top. I read a little further and not only is it made domestically, it's also a Cotton/Tencel® lyocell/polyester blend. Tencel is a new age fiber made from natural cellulose fiber by a European company, Lenzing. It was designed for people with sensitive skin and to have many desirable properties such as breatability, great moisture absorption, strength and durability. Plus, its environmentally-friendly production process, which was awarded the European ECO Award, combined with the purity of the fiber make it very ecofriendly. Lyocell is made from wood pulp and is considered an environmentally friendly alternative to cotton.

Here is another LaROK dress, this one a Micromodal/spandex blend also made in the US. Micromodal fiber is made from beech wood, a natural raw material. It has many of the qualities of cotton, but it's friendlier on the environment and is more durable after repeated cleanings. I've noticed Modal and micromodal in many cloths, if you read the labels, you may find that some of your favorite brands are using it more and more. I recently went to Anthropology and there was a good amount of modal shirts, a few bamboo sweaters and other sustainable options.

LaROK doesn't claim to be thinking sustainably, their website doesn't even list the types of materials or where the cloths are made, but it is refreshing to see some of these alternative start to seep into more mainstream brands. Keep your eyes on the labels, some brands you thought weren't doing much just might be using these new sustainable fabrics.

"UNDER WRAPS" Photoshoot

I did a test shoot with a few Kelly B and Amour Sans Anguish pieces, check it out. There are also a few other shots from the day that don't fit the concept.

iVilliage putting me out of business - good!

iGo Green is a new section of iVillage and they're off to a great start. They're putting me out of business but that's ok, the cause here is to grow the econista movement and they have the eyeballs to do it.

BUT TAKE HEED! Their "partners" are GE & BP oil. BP has been doing a lot of greening of it's brand and, granted, they are doing a lot of research into the future of green energy (investing heavily here in the bay area) but in the end, they are an oil company. And GE may be making a few energy star appliances, but they could be doing a lot more toward bringing eco friendly technology to the sales floor, changing their production practices, using recycled raw materials or a whole list of things they could actually do to become green besides advertising and sponsoring green blogs. We are going to see a lot of this in the coming years - corporations trying to look green instead of be green.

Al Gore '08

Pulled from his Op Ed in the NY Times Today.

Just in the last few months, new studies have shown that the north polar ice cap — which helps the planet cool itself — is melting nearly three times faster than the most pessimistic computer models predicted. Unless we take action, summer ice could be completely gone in as little as 35 years. Similarly, at the other end of the planet, near the South Pole, scientists have found new evidence of snow melting in West Antarctica across an area as large as California.

This is not a political issue. This is a moral issue, one that affects the survival of human civilization. It is not a question of left versus right; it is a question of right versus wrong. Put simply, it is wrong to destroy the habitability of our planet and ruin the prospects of every generation that follows ours.

Gore has experience and he's already won. Let's get him to run (maybe we can feel like we're rewinding the clock 8 years and Bush was just a bad dream).

http://www.algore-08.com/
http://unity08.com/. Unity 08 is an online community that is trying to use the numbers on the internet to draft presidential candidates. So the community elects people, the community votes and then the organizers recruit those individuals. Right now Steven Colbert is doing well because he's the one who really gave the website some legs by having the founder on the show. But there are some serious picks up there. It's worth taking a look.