Habitat

Just last month marks the fifth year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, the catastrophic natural disaster that claimed more than 1,800 lives in the Gulf coast region with damages totaling $80 billion. After the devastation of the hurricane and consequent flooding, it seemed to its residents and many around the world that New Orleans, specifically, was making a painstakingly slow recovery. Frustrated by the sluggish progress, actor Brad Pitt founded the Make It Right Foundation in 2007 to help rebuild the hardest hit region of New Orleans, the Lower 9th ward.

By Stephanie Nickolson, Healthy Green Interior Designer and LuxEco Advocate Originally published at Natural Home & Garden Air pollution abounds in our homes and businesses, but many air purification systems are not safe to use. A Key to Healthy Green Design in your home starts with purifying indoor air quality with plants. Have you ever walked into a store, restaurant or other environment and couldn’t stand the heavily scented aroma that someone used to try and cover up another (worse) scent? Well, I have. It’s one of my favorite stores that I frequent and whenever I enter the washroom, I cannot wait to get out of there as the air is so heavily perfumed it makes me feel ill. This is not an effective remedy, nor is it healthy. Anything that exudes that much fragrance is certainly loaded with phthalates. Most commercial air fresheners mask odors but do nothing to remediate them.

Sustainable Design: Green Cabinetry By: Lisa Adams, Designer and CEO of LA Closet Design and LuxEco Advocate So much is said about going green, but what exactly defines green? In short, green design (also referred to as "sustainable design" or "eco-design”) is the art of designing and building environments that comply with the principles of economic, social, and ecological sustainability. The goal of designing green is to produce places, products and services that significantly reduce or eliminate negative impact on the natural environment, while creating healthy places to live and work. When it comes to your home, educate yourself and make conscious choices about the materials living with you. Do they meet these goals?

6 Ways to Make a More Sustainable "Green" Home By: Molly Rovero, LuxEco Editorial Assistant Many homes weren't build with Green in mind and home improvement...

By: Leslie Harris, Interior Designer, Leslie Harris Interior Design and LuxEco Advocate. I know there is a lot of talk about the value of buying goods that are grown or made locally but for me there are reasons that far outweigh the use of fuels that travel such long distances to get to our shores and that is helping out our fellow human. Artecnica, a Los Angeles based design and manufacturing company, is committed to considering issues of environmental sustainability and responsible manufacturing. Design w/Conscience is a program, begun in 2002, that works with artisan communities in developing countries to produce unique handcrafted objects that reflect indigenous skills to be in accordance with humanitarian and environmentally sensitive principles.

By: Leslie Harris, Interior Designer, Leslie Harris Interior Design and LuxEco Advocate. Jill Salisbury, founder of Chicago based el: Environmental Language, formally educated and trained as an Interior Designer, has found her true calling and passion in the design and manufacturing of furniture. Ten plus years ago, while working as an interior designer, she began learning about the benefits of sustainability but wasn’t able to find furnishings that were stylish and had any kind of environmental initiative. “There wasn’t anything available and I felt the Interior Design community needed to have what I call the Eco-Chic Alternative where you can have style with environmental integrity and promote a healthy indoor air quality for your clients.”

By: Molly Rovero, LuxEco Editorial Assistant One Prize Mowing to Growing, an eco-contest sponsored by the City of New York Parks and Recreation Department and the American Society of Landscape Architects, created an opportunity for architects, designers, planners, scientists, and other related individuals to "reinvent the American garden." This design competition called for “creating productive green space in cities," and they have announced the two first place winners!

By Nancy Chuda  Founder and Editor in Chief and of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World How many of you have seen...

By DENNIS OVERBYE Physics; somewhere over the rainbow. What in the World Is a Higgs Boson?  Peter Higgs, an Edinburgh University professor, discussed the particle that bears...

"The sound of water is so   relaxing," says Peter Logan of Peter Logan Designs in Tujunga California.  "And the water garden is a...

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor-in-Chief LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity. Seeing Citizen Kane...

By: Molly Rovero, LuxEco Editorial Assistant Football, or soccer as we know it in America, really is the sport of the world. World cup matches...

by Mary Elizabeth Williams-Villano, LuxEco Editorial Assistant and author of the Resplendent Repurposing series As if those of us who are concerned about toxic chemicals in our environment didn’t have enough things to worry about, we must now add methamphetamine lab sites, either currently operating or long closed down, to the list. The inconvenient truth is that you could be living in one right now. Or parked next to one. -- Mary Elizabeth Williams-Villano, LuxEcoLiving Editorial Assistant

rstBrands offers a variety of sustainable handmade outdoor furniture and utilizes one of the most important sun shields in the development of their products. The patented Sunbrella fabrics who I might add made environmental responsibility a priority decades before the "green" movement.

Get rid of hazardous substances in your home and clean house with these great green cleaning products. By Brooke Rewa, Lux Eco Editorial Assistant Household cleaning products are full of hazardous substances that put our loved ones at risk. A clean house can be especially dangerous to children and pets. Toxic chemicals from conventional household products can be found on your floors, counters, carpets and transferred directly into the mouth of your pet or child. Many everyday cleaning products contain petroleum based pesticides and denatured ethanol, a type of ethanol that has one or more substances added to it making it poisonous. While we know little about the long-term health affects and environmental damage these hazardous substances can cause, it is safe to say the outcome cannot be good.

By: Molly Rovero, LuxEco Editorial Assistant LuxEco previously explored the idea of growing your own home with Mitchell Joachim's "Don't build your home, grow it!",...

By Nancy Chuda Founder and Editor in Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World. “Unless someone like you cares a whole awful...

By Margret Debanne, Art Historian and LuxEco Advocate With yesterday's naming of SANAA Partners as winner of the Pritzker Prize for Architecture, Kazuyo Sejima has...

By: Molly Rovero, LuxEco Editorial Assistant Recycling and architecture meet on a whole new level with the design of the S_Pavilion by students from Chelsea...

After recently writing an article about Justin Timberlake’s newly reopened green golf course, Mirimichi, I began to dig deeper into the potential hazards that non-green golf courses pose and the ultimate cost that humankind and the environment will have to pay. One of the main and most talked about dangers of golf courses in recent years, has been the use of pesticides on golf course lawns.

Did you know that: We are losing Earth's greatest biological treasures just as we are beginning to appreciate their true value. Rainforests once covered 14%...

By Jessica Borges, LuxEco Living Editorial Assistant We can all thank the sun for making trash disposal a more eco-friendly task; and while we’re at it, we can also thank the creators of BigBelly Solar Trash Cans. These solar powered beefy looking trash cans are sprouting up on street corners in several metropolitan areas with goals of being more cost, time and energy efficient.

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor-in-Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World Cows have a voice too! If you can stomach, actually bare...

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor-in-Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World Saying goodbye to a feathered friend We lost her yesterday. It...

by Mary Elizabeth Williams-Villano, LuxEco Living Editorial Assistant A future gift, recycled in a thrift store, made from recycled materials. Now that's a LuxEco Resplendent Repurposing triple header! by Mary Elizabeth Williams-Villano, LuxEcoLiving Editorial Assistant

By: Molly Rovero, LuxEco Living Editorial Assistant Among Madame Gana Walska’s collection in the theatre garden are grotesque figures, which she hid in the ground to protect during the world war. She also had a garden clock with the different star signs. Her actual birthday is unknown but Lotusland believes that she was born in June, making her a Cancer. Join Nancy Chuda and Gwen Stauffer as they journey through these two lovely gardens.

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor-in Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World Here's a LuxEcoLiving4U time saver. It's called Hay Handle.           Time...

By: Leslie Harris, Interior Designer, Leslie Harris Interior Design and LuxEco Advocate In October 2009, the U.S. Department of Energy sponsored what has turned out to be a biannual competition called Solar Decathlon on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. 20 teams from colleges and universities from the U.S., Canada, Germany and Spain were selected and asked to design, build and operate an energy efficient house powered exclusively by the sun. The winning team produced a house that best blended affordability, ease of living, attractiveness, comfortable and healthy indoor environmental conditions, enough energy to run all household appliances and hot water as well as producing more energy than it consumes. Workshops were provided about the current state of green design technologies, jobs and the future of the smart grid.

By Lisa Adams, Designer and CEO of LA Closet Design and LuxEco Advocate Maximizing a closet is the number one issue for most people, and...

By: Lorri Laird, LuxEco Editorial Assistant “Healthy Child Healthy World has gone above and beyond in creating a real-life example of how to create a healthier home,” said Victoria Di Iorio, Project Director for the Healthy Child Healthy World Healthy Home 2010 Designer Showcase and Tour. Di Iorio, who also serves as the Education & Outreach Coordinator for the non-profit charity Healthy Child Healthy World, recently spoke with LuxEco Living regarding the Healthy Home 2010 project and also shared her passion for green and healthy living.

By Florence “Flip” Ross, LuxEco Advocate One day at work, I happened to mention that I found these hills so pleasant to look at every time I passed them, and I wondered how they had developed there in the midst of all the flatness, which looked like God had ironed the land. Everyone laughed and said: “Don’t you know what those hills are?

By Trish Holder Courtesy of Greenspiration Home Are you a blissfully ignorant homeowner? Do you eat, drink, shower, sleep, wash dishes, etc. in your...

By: Molly Rovero LuxEco Editorial Assistant A recent report created for North Carolina’s Waste Awareness & Reduction Network (NC WARN) was titled “ Solar and...

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor in Chief of LuxEcoLiving and Healthy Child Healthy World You don't want to miss the breakfast or the bed...

By: Leslie Harris, Interior Designer, Leslie Harris Interior Design and LuxEco Advocate With as much time as we spend in our homes these days, we want to create a home that is a retreat, that is what we speak to, but we want our retreat to be safe so this is definitely going to be an option. Certainly they don’t have to take it all the way to major extremes, but they can do little things that will make a huge difference in their health, their design and in the environment.