Inflight Magazine of Brussels Airlines

Eco

A new book and design agency offers easy solutions for creating a chic yet green home

Style conscience

If you want to make your home more sustainable without losing your sense of style, a new book could have the answer – you need some eco chic in your life

“Design should be about thinking about our lives today and how they will be in the future,” says architect and designer Oliver Heath, pictured below, author of Urban Eco Chic. “We’ve become very short-term in the way we think – a ‘buy and move on’ attitude. But times are changing, and personal expression is replacing quick, cheap fixes.

"Urban eco chic is a balance of technology, nature and vintage that creates a particular style; a design aesthetic that makes us want to be somewhere that is both functional and beautiful. I used to be a windsurfing instructor while I was studying architecture, teaching people how to respect and get the best out of nature. In the same way, I wanted to think about buildings that worked with nature rather than trying to shut it out.”

Creating your own urban eco chic

Vintage furniture not only adds character to your home, but also means you’re saving something from being added to landfill.

Draught-proofing – all homes need ventilation to stop damp and mould, but there’s a difference between this and draughts. Fit simple draught excluders such as a thick curtain (another excuse to go vintage) over doors, and block up disused fireplaces.

Light bulbs – switching to low-energy bulbs will cut your energy bills by a sixth if you’re still using a traditional 60W bulb.

An eco shower head mixes water with air – it’s like having a shower in tonic water as the water becomes effervescent, cutting your water flow from about 12 litres of water per minute to six. And it simply screws on to your existing shower head.

The more natural light that comes into your home, the less you need electric light – and if you turn lights on for five minutes less each day you’ll be saving all year. Keep windows clean and free of obstruction, and maximize natural light by bouncing it off mirrors and white surfaces.

Clean living?

The choices we make in our daily activities contribute to greenhouse gas emissions and influence climate change

A carbon footprint is a measure of the impact our activities have on the environment, and in particular climate change. It relates to the amount of greenhouse gases produced in our day- to-day lives through burning fossil fuels for electricity, heating and transportation, for example. On average, a Western European emits the equivalent of 13 tonnes of carbon dioxide annually. By 2050, there will be an estimated 9 billion people on Earth, and the planet will only be able to absorb 1.1 tonnes of carbon dioxide per person. This means that we will need to reduce our emissions by about 90%.

Some activities that produce the equivalent of one tonne of carbon dioxide:

Consuming 230 pieces of 250g steak
Consuming 100,000 pages of A4 paper
Consuming 170 T-shirts
Consuming 3 months of heating (350 litres of heating oil or 450 cubic metres of natural gas)
Travelling 10,000km by car (Polo Blue Motion)

NEED TO KNOW

As well as Urban Eco Chic (€17), Oliver Heath has launched a design consultancy to help you get the most out of your home in as little as two hours. Visit www.oliverheath.com

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