The Design Files Daily

Sustainable Design

Monday, June 20, 2011

Beautiful Bio Table Ware

Wasara bio-degradable tableware from Japan – available at The R.E.A.L Store in Sydney

Wasara bio-degradable tableware from Japan – available at The R.E.A.L Store in Sydney

I have been SO INSPIRED by this week’s Guest Blogger, Liane Rossler, that I am kicking things off with a little post about something she introduced me to on a recent trip to Sydney.

Bio table ware.  Sounds boring right?  WRONG!  The stunning examples of bio-degradable tableware in this post prove that the most ETHICAL option can also be the most BEAUTIFUL!  Ethical = beautiful.  Gotta love that.

The Japanese WASARA tableware above literally has to be seen to be believed.  It is so so beautiful.  Made from a combination of reed, bamboo and bagasse (sugercane waste product), it feels soft and velvety, it holds your food / liquid for one-time-use… and it is completely compost-able afterwards.  SO. GOOD.  The stunning organic shapes come in tiny canape size or larger plates, cups and bowls – truly they are so special you won’t even want to use them!   You can buy them in Sydney at The R.E.A.L Store (featured in Liane’s Guest Blog today!) and they also sell online. Prices starting at a very reasonable $2.00 a unit – they’re sold in packs of 8 but larger custom orders can be arranged.

Another gorgeous option, for a slightly more rustic picnicky feel, are these beautiful bowls and plates (below) from I Ran The Wrong Way, also in Sydney (also online!).  Again they’re totally compostable and biodegradable.  They’re made from the naturally shed leaf sheaths of the Areca Palm, from plantation palms in India, utilising a manufacturing process which avoids chemicals, resins, dyes or synthetic materials.  They’re sold in packs of 24 for just $12.50 (that’s .5oc a unit.  bargain).

You can learn more about The R.E.A.L Store TODAY on the Guest Blog, and I Ran The Wrong Way on Wednesday!   Two very inspiring gorgeous Sydney shops.

Do support these lovely thoughtful retailers and snap up some of their beautiful bio-wares in preparation for your next party.  There is seriously NO EXCUSE for awful plastic plates next time you organise a BBQ, kids birthday party or picnic!  Plastic!?  Ugh!

Bio Tableware from I Ran The Wrong Way in Sydney
Posted by Lucy at 6:00 am
Categories - Event Design, Stationery & Paper, Sustainable Design Comments (8)
Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Sydney Home – Liane Rossler and family

The Queens Park home of Liane Rossler and family!   The family have an incredible contemporary art collection – YES that’s a Rosalie Gascoigne (close up bottom left). Swooon.  All photo by me.
Dining / kitchen area – extensive collection of vases and vessels from Dinosaur Designs of course!

Amazing artworks on every surface – amongst cute creations by kids Lana and Scarlet.  Top left – a polka-dot piece by one of Liane’s all time favourite artists – Yayoi Kusama.

One of the very first interviews I ever posted on The Design Files was with Sydney designer (and last week’s supercycling guest blogger) Liane Rossler!  If you’ve been reading for a reeaaaallly long time, you might remember that interview, and you’d know I was more than a little starstruck at the time!  Since then Liane has become a wonderful friend and I have been extremely lucky to meet her family, and visit their incredible home!  I THINK I may have hyperventilated the first time I visited – hopefully I concealed it well enough.  :)

Liane lives here with her gorgeous girls Lana and Scarlet, and husband Sam Marshall – Sam is an architect and designed their amazing home.  Surprisingly, this home wasn’t built from scratch – it’s a clever (and very thorough!) re-model of an existing 1920′s brick bungalow.  Paramount to Liane and Sam was re-designing this home with sustainability in mind.  Doors and windows have been positioned carefully to protect the house from the sun, keeping the interior cool in summer, and the layout is designed to encourage natural ventilation.  Conversely, sunlight has been maximised efficiently to light interior spaces – the pixel-like skylights in the upstairs rooms are incredible!  Of course materials used throughout are all sustainable, and you can be assured there are water tanks, compost bins and a vegie garden out the back!

BUT I won’t harp on about the many GREEN credentials of this home – after all, an eco-friendly home shouldn’t be an unusual thing!  Liane hopes it won’t be too long before the words ‘sustainable’ or ‘green’ are simply implicit when talking about good, efficient design!  Hear hear!

HUGE thanks to the Marshall-Rossler clan for sharing their beautiful home with us today!  If you, too, are a Liane R fan, you can follow her on Twitter (she’s prolific!) and don’t forget to keep up with her Supercycling antics over here!

CLICK HERE for many more pics!

Posted by Lucy at 6:00 am
Categories - Australian Homes, Sustainable Design, Sydney Homes, Uncategorized Comments (17)
Monday, April 18, 2011

Supercyclers are GO on the Guest Blog!

Meet Sarah K and Liane Rossler – aka SUPERCYCLERS!  This super creative pair are committed to turning waste materials into clever, useful and beautiful new things – they hope to inspire others to think carefully before contributing to mindless landfill!  In addition to joining us this week on the Guest Blog, Sarah K and Liane are also currently exhibiting their PLASTIC FANTASTIC supercycled creations at The Other Hemisphere exhibition in Milan!

This week we have a brilliantly dynamic and very creative pair on the Guest Blog – Meet Liane Rossler and Sarah K – aka SUPERCYCLERS!  Sydney-based designers Liane and Sarah have joined forces recently, brought together by their shared passion for GREAT DESIGN that is also inherently ENVIRONMENTALLY RESPONSIBLE!   Liane and Sarah have been collaborating with other local designers and experimenting with re-cycling waste materials to create clever, useful new things!   Their first project is a series of vessels made from re-purposed plastic bags – such a simple and inspired idea.  Plastic bags are one of the worst offenders in our environment – DID YOU KNOW there are huge garbage patches of plastic swirling around in the oceans!?  Sadly, almost all the plastic that has ever been made is still around somewhere on the planet today. Of course it is best of all to avoid disposable plastics BUT, if you do find yourself with waste materials and plastic at home, Liane and Sarah hope to inspire you with some crafty things you can do rather than throwing these things away.  Because as the Supercycler’s mantra goes – “there is no away!“.

This month Liane and Sarah are showing their PLASTIC FANTASTIC creations in an amazing exhibition called The Other Hemisphere in Milan!  The Other Hemisphere is a BRILLIANT exhibition of Australian design at the Milan Furniture Fair this year, also curated by Sarah K!   It features many fab local designers including Daniel : Emma – I am SO JEALOUS I wish I was there!!  We hope many designers and Milan fair attendees are super inspired by your Supercycling efforts ladies!

Pop by the Guest Blog all this week as Liane and Sarah share some very inspiring examples of Supercycling from across the globe – ending with a little round-up on Friday direct from Sarah K in Milan!  Yippeee!

*AND don’t forget to bookmark the Supercyclers BLOG where Liane and Sarah plan to document their Supercycling creations – they would also love to hear from you if you have any Supercycling discoveries of your own!

Posted by Lucy at 5:57 am
Categories - Australian design, Sustainable Design Tagged | Comments (2)
Monday, February 28, 2011

Greenhouse by Joost – The Design Files first ever FILM!

Greenhouse by Joost film

It is a little known fact that I actually studied film making many moons ago at uni.  But in the 10 years that have passed since then I completely forgot how much freaking effort it is to make a short film.  Agh!  It is a LOT of work and also requires a vast amount of help and favours and the kindness of strangers (and independent musicians).  THANKYOU YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE!

ANYWAY.  How exciting!  This is the first ever Design Files film!  It is just 5 mins long and documents the fantabulous GREENHOUSE BY JOOST sustainable restaurant currently in the best location money can’t buy on the foreshore at Sydney Harbour (it’s still there for just a few more weeks!)

If you have any trouble viewing the film, or would like to watch it a bit BIGGER, pop over to view it on Vimeo.

Please watch it! Also please forward it on to help spread word of the Greenhouse, because Joost truly is one hell of an inspiring guy and you know, he’s not bad looking either.

Nick Lovell and Eli Wolfe kindly gave permission for us to use their music in the film  – please show your support by visiting their websites!

Posted by Lucy at 6:00 am
Categories - Sustainable Design, Sydney, Uncategorized, film Comments (39)
Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Greenhouse by Joost in Sydney!

Joost Bakker’s Greenhouse in Sydney – just opened last Friday!

Joost’s signature vertical garden covers the exterior of the structure

Re-purposed design details – walls in the bathrooms made from salvaged timber packing boxes, lights made from simple jam jars, beer glasses and candle holders made from discarded Little Creatures bottles, stunning herringbone floor created from rubber salvaged from an industrial conveyor belt!

Dear JOOST BAKKER,

How do you do it?

How is it that on December 23rd, the Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority offered you, out of the blue, this amazing location at Circular Quay for one of your world-famous Greenhouse temporary restaurants, and less than 2 months later it is HERE for us all to admire?

How is it that local council seem to turn around approval on all your crazy ideas in a timeframe most architects could not even imagine in their wildest dreams?

How is it that you manage to inspire so many brilliant and super high profile local creative people to be involved (David Bromley, David Band, Spacecraft, Queen B Candles, Top chefs Jason Chan and Matt Stone, to name only a few) – with little or no lead time at all?

How is it that you rope in support from so many businesses and project sponsors (Framecad, Little Creatures, Miele and many more) without a corporate logo to be seen?

How is it that you manage to get by on about 2 hrs sleep each night, without a wink of grumpiness, red-eye or evidence of energy depletion?

How is it that you inspired this design blogger to travel to Sydney twice in the past month just to see what you’re up to?

I’ve heard from reliable sources that you have Jedi Powers.  I believe it.  You’re AMAZING.

From Lucy ;)

Postscript - I visited Mr Bakker’s AMAZING new Greenhouse which opened in Sydney last week and I’m telling you, it must be seen to be believed.  If you are anywhere near Sydney in the next 6 weeks (and trust me, Melbourne is close enough to warrant a visit!), you really MUST go!  Much more info here and here.  I took MANY more photos which you can view in  the photo gallery here - please pop over and check them out to get a sense of the immense scale of this inspiring project!

The Greenhouse is essentially a temporary restaurant and bar which promotes sustainable construction techniques and operational processes… the entire building is created using re-cycled and re-cyclable materials, and runs so efficiently it creates no waste.  ALL food scraps are composted on site, herbs and salad vegies are grown on the roof, all produce is supplied in re-usable containers (no disposable plastic here!) and all furniture, tableware and design details are created from re-purposed materials which would otherwise have been landfill.  The Greenhouse Sydney will operate for just 8 WEEKS before upping sticks and commencing a WORLD TOUR!  Get in while you can, people!

AND, last but not least, The Design Files first ever SHORT FILM documenting this incredible project is coming very soon…  stay tuned!

Greenhouse by Joost
Campbells Cove, The Rocks
Sydney

(ie the same side at the MCA, just at the end of the Quay)

Open Monday noon – midnight, Sunday 10.00am – midnight, and every other day from 7.30am – midnight.

Joost on site, Australia Day – on zero sleep after working through the night.

Joost insulates the structure with his genius hay bale / steel system – Jan 26th

Scrambling to finish on opening day! Feb 9th.  Chairs made from re-cycled irrigation pipes and salvaged leather off-cuts.

David Bromley’s artwork covers the facade – painted in one night and one day (Jan 25th and 26th)

Bromley faces his fears in the Cherry Picker!

Bromley a little happier on solid ground! Jan 26th.

The unique Framecad system means all the steel for the structure is formed to spec on site using a machine which spits out the exact shape and length of steel required – ie no offcuts, no waste, and minimum carbon footprint.

Oh hello!  Even on a building site, there is no escaping the internet!  Jan 26th.

MANY MORE PICS OVER HERE!

Posted by Lucy at 6:00 am
Categories - Architecture, Sustainable Design, Sydney Comments (18)
Monday, October 18, 2010

Guest Blogging this week – Re-design round up with Lucy King!

Customised vintage plates by this weeks guest blogger – Lucy King

Do you remember Lucy King!?   You should!  She is awesome.  You have seen her illustrations and jewellery design here, and you have even snooped inside her home here!

AND now, you get to see Lucy all week on the Guest Blog!

Lucy has a passion for recycled, re-purposed and re-used design (I am still getting used to the ‘upcycle’ term… still seems a bit weird to me, I think I will stick with ‘re-purposed’ for now :)

ANYWAY you have never seen such brilliant examples of recycled and re-purposed design!  Ms King is definitely an expert in the field!  This week she’ll share a brilliant round-up of homewares, furniture and jewellery finds, all of which re-use found materials in some way.

Pats on the back all round to Lucy and the brilliant Jenny B who dreamed up this excellent re-design round-up idea.  Genius!

Make sure you pop over to the Guest Blog this week for Lucy’s fantastic finds! (and please leave a comment if you like her work! She would love to hear from you!) x

Decanterlights by UK designer Lee Broom – on Lucy King’s Guest Blog today!
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Posted by Lucy at 5:45 am
Categories - Craft, Sustainable Design, Uncategorized Comments (3)