When do you take your Christmas decorations down? And what do you do with them?

Posted on January 6, 2012 by cpotter

There is always confusion with when you are supposed to take down Christmas decorations after the seasonal festivities.

According to the Christian tradition, the tree, decorations and cards should be all packed up by Twelfth Night – January 6th – lest your house be filled with misfortune for the coming year. If you miss the date, you are supposed to keep everything up till next year. Fine by us we say – we love having a living tree inside.

But really, whenever you take your decorations down, there are a load of ways to ensure that nothing goes to waste.

If you have a real tree, you will need to look for Christmas tree recycling points, which are run by most councils and positioned in various public locations such as designated areas within parks. Brighton has a range of locations for Christmas tree recycling which is great. Some councils are even offering to pick up undecorated trees from outside people’s houses this year to go for recycling. The trees are collected and shredded for compost so nothing goes to waste.

If you are not lucky enough to have a designated recycling point near you do not despair – many councils will accept them as green waste at recycling sites – ring to check before you make a trip.

If sending your tree away for recycling is simply not an option, you can still make use of the tree at home. Branches stripped from the main trunk can be used to protect expanses of exposed earth in the veg patch from cats and birds, and the trunk can be used as a pea pole or plant support. With all the little notches from the branches it makes a great climber pole.

And do not forget your cards – many councils will pick them up in your curbside recycling boxes, or you can take them to points for recycling at many high street retailers – The Woodland Trust teams up with shops such as Marks and Spencers to ensure that recycling points are spread around in January. And as well as the card being recycled, retailers pledge to plant trees for every 1000 or so cards which are processed.

Everyone wins.

(image via The Woodland Trust)

best picks from the eco sales – the grey felt shoulder bag

Posted on January 3, 2012 by cpotter

Our last post in this mini series sets us up for the return to work.

A good, fairtrade, simple bag can be hard to find, but this lovely and classic grey felt shoulder bag from Oxfam ticks all of our simple yet stylish work wardrobe checklist.

A good size, a little detail, pockets, zip closure and short or long handles. What more could you wish for. A bit more colour? It is also available in red.

Get yours at Oxfam now for a bargain £14.99 - a 50% reduction.

best picks from the eco sales – the Owl Wireless Electricity Monitor

Posted on January 2, 2012 by cpotter

Start the New Year in the best possible way, with a resolution to reduce the amount of energy you use. And one of the best ways to keep an eye on things is to use a gadget – like this Owl Wireless Electricity Monitor.

This brilliant little tool gives you up to the second information on the amount of energy you are using – both in power terms and in cost, so you can always see what is draining your meter and pocket. It really is a habit changer.

No longer will you leave appliances on standby, lights on in rooms which are uninhabited or boil a kettle which is overfilled. You literally see the pennies dripping away.

Well worth the £32.95 (reduction of 8%) at the Ethical Superstore.

best picks from the eco sales – the All Waste Kitchen Composter

Posted on December 30, 2011 by cpotter

At this time of year you will probably be all too aware of the amount of food waste that builds up in our kitchens. Many of us have become pretty good at putting our waste onto the compost heap, but cooked food is not the best of ideas as they can attract rats.

Therefore cooked food is mostly wasted and sent to landfill.

One alternative is to purchase an in house composter, such as this All Waste Kitchen Composter, which can take around 2 weeks of waste food, and with the help of a bacteria rich activator bran, can turn the waste into the beginnings of good compost and liquid feed in another 2 weeks.

Now available with a 29% reduction at the Ethical Superstore for £29.75.

best picks from the eco sales – the Ecological Calendar 2012

Posted on December 29, 2011 by cpotter

The calendar is a very traditional gift at this time of year, but there is one which we guarantee will be very different from those you will be used to receiving.

The Ecological Calendar 2012 guides you through the seasons with four, illustrated metre long panels which track the sun, moon, tides, planets and star positions, along with brilliant notes on all manner of ecological and sustainable matters.

We always have one of these in the studio, and we guarantee that it will change the way you look at the pattern of the year.

Available at the Ethical Superstore for £6.49 – a saving of 40%.

best picks from the eco sales – the Orla Kiely Teacup Dress

Posted on December 28, 2011 by cpotter

January sales often mean clothes shopping, so today’s pick in this mini series is a truly beautiful dress.

Designed for People Tree by print queen Orla Kiely, the teacup dress is printed with teacups all over 100% cotton, in a lovely green shade.

Now available with a 40% reduction at the Ethical Superstore for £56.99. If you hurry, it could be your New Year dress!

best picks from the eco sales – the paper seedling pot maker

Posted on December 27, 2011 by cpotter

We are taking a few days off, with the studio being back up and raring to go on 3rd Jan, so we thought we’d leave you with a small series of posts on our pick of the best buys in the post Christmas sales. Ethical, beautiful, recycled, upcycled, unique and energy saving.

Got some money this Christmas? The next few posts will give you a purchase suggestion – one per day.

Today’s suggestion comes from the excellent Cox and Cox and is a great small purchase, ready for the forthcoming spring. If you are green fingered in any way and you do not own a paper seedling pot maker you are missing a trick.

Use old newspapers to make pots (ideal for a rainy day) for your seedlings, then compost them when you are done. No more storing of plastic pots.

A bargain – 50% off at £5.25 each.

our top ten presents you can find at a charity shop near you now!

Posted on December 23, 2011 by cpotter

It seems as though our post yesterday on buying your extra glasses from your local charity shop was extremely well timed as according to a recent survey by the Charity Retail Association and as reported on the BBC yesterday afternoon, charity shops are seeing a welcome boom this Christmas.

An estimated 40% of us will look at charity shops for our stocking fillers and other presents this Christmas, for a variety of reasons.

For some it is to support those in need, for others it is the search for something unique, vintage or retro and for others it is all about saving money.

Personally, we are huge supporters of our local charity shops in Brighton and Hove as we are always on the look out for something a little different – both for the studio and our clients, as well as at Christmas.

Do not forget that a little bit of imagination can go a very long way when selecting a potential present from a secondhand outlet, and on this day – predicted as the busiest time for shopping in the year – it could be the perfect solution to that problem present you are looking for. Here are our top ten charity shop buys:

1 – Pairs of beautiful sherry glasses can be paired with a small bottle of homemade, or shop bought tipple.

2 – A candlestick given a bit of a polish can be teamed with a couple of long candles – all wrapped in tissue they will be very well received.

3 – Beautiful silk scarves in modern and retro patterns are available in almost every charity shop and for very little money indeed – press them very gently and wrap lovingly in tissue paper and place in a box – they will look much more precious.

4 – Vintage bone handled cutlery is often seen in varying styles in charity shops – buy a bundle of forks and knives and tie them with short lengths of ribbon in bundles. Silver plated cutlery is also often found in their original boxes and is a great present.

5 – Brooches are a brilliant stocking filler buy – many are crammed with rhinestones and a small, plain box will set them off a treat.

6 – Books are often read once and given to charity shops – trawl the shelves to find a hardly touched copy, or why not look for a vintage classic? One of my favourite buys was a very old hard backed copy of Treasure Island which I bought for 50p. It did not matter to me that it had an inscription in the front at all – it added to the history.

7 – Old pudding basins are often seen at this time of year (charity shops save them throughout the year and get them all out at Christmas). They are brilliant gifts for a foodie and perfect teamed with a special edible treat.

8 – Giving flowers to someone this Christmas? Why not team them with a lovely cut glass vase? If a bit grubby, give it a light scrub with some bicarbornate of soda and it will gleam.

9 – Linen is a lovely gift – especially for someone who likes vintage styles. Check teacloths, table cloths, napkins and even bed sheets for holes, odd smells and stains (they may not shift), press with a steam iron and layer with tissue paper (unbleached if you can find it).

10 – Know someone who has to wear a tie to work? Your charity shop will be inundated with them – new, old, vintage, polyester, silk, comedy, tasteful and probably even musical, so why not buy them five – one for each of the working days in the week.

So – there is our top ten readily available present ideas which you can find at your local charity shop. Panic ye not – come over to the secondhand side.

(image via the Guardian)

raise your vintage glasses…

Posted on December 22, 2011 by cpotter

Now is the time when we all start to get into the slight panic about Christmas – not only the presents and the wrapping, but the last minute parties and get togethers, making sure there is enough food to feed a small army and battling around the shops for the last few bits.

One panic we hear again and again is the small fact of not having enough glasses for those sudden family descents and mulled wine or sherry tipples.

But, glasses take up a lot of space which many people do not have, and large amounts of glasses are rarely used throughout the rest of the year.

So, what do we suggest?

Go to your nearest High Street and buy a collection of random clear glasses from your local charity shops – not only will you be supporting worthwhile causes, you will be recycling, and if you give them back in January, the charities will benefit again.

Plus, a collection of unmatched glasses look fantastically informal and eclectic on the table – make the most of the individual elements, adding candles in nicely cut glass or tinted glass ones.

And – if no glass is the same, nobody will get theirs mixed up with someone elses. Bonus.

five gold rings and ethical jewellery…

Posted on December 21, 2011 by cpotter

I have pretty much finished my seasonal shopping, but Saturday I will be accompanying my Dad around the streets of Brighton, shopping for my Mum – a family tradition started when I was young. We almost always forget where we parked the car, and the day finishes with a bag of chips from Bankers.

Anyway – to the point – we always end up in a jewellers of some description – along with everyone else in Brighton it seems. I don’t know exactly how much money is spent on jewellery over Christmas, but I know a lot gets spent and at a massive cost to our pockets and to the environment.

Some ethical gold exists, but most of the 2.5 tonnes mined annually (most of which is open cast), is not. Cyanide is used to draw out the gold which can contaminate the surrounding area, processing uses vast amounts of water, and exploitative labour is not unusual, including the employment of children.

So, what is a girl (or guy) to do?

Well, some ethical jewellers exist, like CRED , April Doubleday and Fifi Bijoux, but to stick to my favourite mantra of reduce, reuse, recycle, we should first reduce our lust for the raw material.

Not going to happen?

Well, you could hunt down an old special piece in an antiques store, or for something a bit different, why don’t you reuse and recycle your loved ones own jewellery from Crimbles past, using a jewellery remodelling service such as that of local Brighton designer and craftswoman Katie Weiner, who will take your chosen selection and bring them together into something to be proud of.

Unfortunately you are out of time for a Christmas commission, but why not instead purchase something that has been made from other peoples discarded pieces – Katie also lovingly hunts down and pieces together other gems to create wonderful and completely singular items of jewellery.

So, there are lots of eco options for the Christmas jewellery option if you look in the right places.

the ecospot

the green orientated ramblings of the claire potter design studio…

Category Archives: I’m dreaming of a green christmas