My Favorite Color is Green

A couple of weeks ago I published a post on my thoughts of the book Cradle-to-Cradle and how successfully it deals with sustainability. However, I truly learned a lot about sustainability from a project that I did in my Materials class after I read the book. Each student in the class was assigned to research the sustainability and compatibility to C2C design of a material (i.e. quartz countertops, 3-form, stained concrete flooring, bamboo, etc.) Instead of being assigned one material, however, I had the all encompassing topic of sustainable furniture. At first I did not know where to begin because of how broad the assignment was. After much research, however, I believe that I learned much more about successful sustainability and its challenges than most of the girls in my class.

To begin, I discussed the three main criteria of sustainable furniture: materials, design and manufacture, and buying and selling. A piece of furniture is sustainable if it is created using as few of our planet's resources as possible while also being durable, low-toxic, and easy to disassemble. An easy tip to remember is that durable design=timeless design. If a product is made using cheap materials, the quality and look of the product is in jeopardy. Also, an important aspect to consider when buying furniture is to look locally first because not only does it ensure lower carbon levels, but you can support small businesses and local economies while saving money on shipping rates. I bought a retro, orange velvet armchair from my best friend's older sister to put in my dorm this year. Not only was it comfortable and brightened up my cinder-block room, but it always became a topic of discussion amongst guests. I really think I will keep that chair forever!

However, a piece of furniture is not considered "sustainable" in the consumer world unless it is registered under the myriad certification agencies. This is a flaw because all of these certifications are turning design into an inefficient bureaucracy. For a piece of wooden furniture to be considered sustainable, for example, it must be created from wood from a sustainably harvested forest registered by the Forest Stewardship Council. The FSC evaluates both forest management activities and chain of custody. COC is an entirely different topic that stems from certification agencies and it allows products to be segregated and identified as having come from a particular source, i.e. an FSC certified forest. Scientific Certification Systems issues COC's and also offers validation and verification services for forestry carbon offset projects. Basically, SCS helps regulate air quality. But, we're not done! The piece of furniture would then be evaluated by the Sustainable Furniture Council, which is a non-profit, balanced coalition of industry players created to promote sustainable practices among manufacturers, retailers, and consumers. SFC wants to maintain a healthy balance between environmental conservation, social equity, and economic development under the Life-Cycle Assessment. LCA's or actual environmental data are required for sustainable product certification on a product platform basis. LCA identifies 12 benefits/impacts of products for all stages of life. The USGBC is a non-profit community of leaders working to make green buildings available to everyone within a generation. Their certification is probably the most common known: Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED). Right now, the only benefit to having a certified green building besides claiming to be environmentally aware and protecting the earth is saving money on energy bills. However, many of these certifications are very expensive and you do not even get a tax write-off yet. I know this paragraph was a bit overwhelming, but I just wanted to accentuate how the certification process needs to change before green design becomes more prominent.

Besides certifications, sustainable furniture is made from sustainable methods and materials that do not require removing anything from the earth that cannot be replenished. Therefore, these pieces of furniture are most likely going to be made of certified or reclaimed wood, bamboo, or recycled metals and plastics. For instance, the beautiful table above was created from 1,000 year-old wood retrieved from the bottom of a deep swamp in South America. You can see how wide the tree was because the tabletop is made from one entire slab of wood!

This brings me to correct a common misnomer about reclaimed versus recycled wood. Reclaimed wood is procured from the deconstruction of existing structures while recycled wood is obtained from salvage boards or trees and is re-purposed to produce flooring and particleboard. Now, be watchful and mindful to buy furniture that has not been made from pressure-treated lumber or particleboard because it produces very poor air quality and can cause harm to people when they breathe in the air. I also want to show you an innovative chair that I found on the internet. This Reee chair is made entirely from recycled Playstation 2's! You can visit the company's website http://www.inhabitat.com/2007/05/15/the-reee-recycled-playstation-chair/ and order your own chair. Don't just play your new and improved game console without sitting in what once kept you from being insanely bored on a Friday night.

I know that this post is extensive, however, my project was surprisingly extensive and I did much more research than I initially believed I would have to do. But, I am glad I did because I was introduced to an amazing company called Herman Miller, Inc. that specializes in sustainable office furniture. To keep my project relatively simple, I focused on one Herman Miller storage unit and its sustainability because it is a multi-purpose product with many parts. The Teneo Storage unit consists of 66% steel, 18% wood, 11% aluminum, 3% laminate, and 2% plastic. All of the steel and aluminum components of this unit are 100% recyclable and the entire product is 78% recyclable. My over-all cradle-to-cradle rating of this product was 9 out of 10, in which I took off 1/2 point for VOC emissions from laminate and veneers and another 1/2 point for energy expenses from manufacturing and transportation. However, the energy emissions are inevitable with any product, no matter the degree of sustainability.

After researching this product, I realized how amazing and innovative the Herman Miller corporation truly is. It was created in 1905 in Zeeland, Michigan and, interestingly, the company's mission was to provide environmentally-friendly furniture. The company has had over 100 years to perfect its goal and finds the urge insatiable. One of the most interesting findings the company made was that lay people no longer have the time nor desire to get something fixed if it is broken. Just think of how the career of fixing broken clocks and watches is becoming obsolete. People would much rather replace the entire product than get it repaired. Herman Miller discovered that products made these days are usually not made from homogenous materials. At least two materials (i.e. plastic and steel) are blended together so the broken piece is not easily replaceable. To attempt to promote repairing items instead of buying a brand-new one, Herman Miller decided to see how much time it would lapse before one of their most popular Aeron chairs was taken apart. After 3 hours, the innovators decided that they needed to create a chair that could be disassembled in a matter of minutes.
However, the newer Mirra chair seen above can be taken apart in a matter of minutes. All of the parts are replaceable so it is easy to repair the chair without buying a brand-new one. I believe that this innovation by Herman Miller will solve many problems about the obsolescence of products when new ones are displayed on the shelves. One of our first projects in our materials class was to create a new product made out of items that already exist. We were supposed to focus on how easily the new product can be manipulated and how it would affect the environment if it was actually manufactured on a large-scale. My group made a DVD case made out of old VHS tapes (yes, we found the irony of it funny too). Our focus was to create a project from an out-dated piece of technology and we found the VHS tapes a good choice because their size is relatively consistent. These days, people have become so focused on the aesthetics of their technological accessories (me included, I do have a handy-dandy iphone,) and the manufacturing companies are having to create new products at an alarmingly fast rate in order to stay one-step ahead of the consumers' desires. Therefore, the designs are very different and it is usually cheaper to replace a phone or other piece of technology than repair one. If I had a nickel, well lets adjust for inflation and say $100, for every new cell phone introduced this year I would be able to pay for my study abroad trip to Italy next summer.

To conclude, I will leave you with some great pictures of sustainable furniture pieces that I found throughout my project. I hope you enjoy them as much as I did!