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Category Archives: gifts
Pre-Xmas Sale at State of Green
We all love a sale BEFORE Xmas, and State of Green has just gone ON SALE! This is your chance to complete your Xmas shopping from the peace of your armchair/desk stool/kitchen bench, and get it all delivered to you without fighting for one parking spot! We’ll even wrap your gifts for you if you request it during check out (request it in the Comments field).
Just some of the items on sale!
The above is just a taste of the many items we have marked down, in preparation for new great eco wares arriving in the new year! Stock is limited so first in first serve. MERRY Xmas all!
Posted in Eco Xmas, gifts
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Australian made sustainable design on show at Pure Pod’s Pop Up Shop
For those of you living in Northern New South Wales, you are in for a treat! Leading Australian eco fashion brand Pure Pod have just opened a “Pop-Up” concept store in Lennox Head bringing to you not only their beautiful classic fashion range, but also a collection of other quality Australian eco brands – Perfect timing for picking up a bevy of sustainable design treats!
Inside PurePod's Pop Up store in Lennox Head, NSW. Image: PurePod
Kelli Donovan and Sean Watson are the designers behind Pure Pod, who have already made their mark in the eco fashion industry both at home and internationally – not bad for a brand that is just four years old! Their Australian made garments made from bamboo, organic cotton, pure merino wool, hemp, soy, silk and linen have been exhibited at the Paris Eco Fashion Week, been listed as a finalist in the FGI Sustainable Business awards (twice) and were selected by the Australian Government to take part in the “G’Day USA” annual Trade mission in New York earlier this year.
Classic Sustainable fashion by Pure Pod Image: PurePod
The PurePod pop-up shop presents a marvellous opportunity to support local Australian businesses who are really doing their bit to produce well made products, that tread lightly on the environment. Other brands on show include ONE Organic Kids Clothing, Bird Textiles, Namaste Natural Bath/Beauty products, Wheel of Life Ceramics, Dark Horse Jewellery & Anne Leon Natural Dyed Silks – something for kids, mum, dad, Grandma, Grandpa and friends!
Treats in store ... Image: Pure Pod
Don’t despair if you can’t make it to the pop-up shop in person – Pure Pod is also online, so your new Xmas outfit could be on its way to your letterbox sooner than you think (pssst – they have free shipping until Xmas eve!).
17th Nov – 5th Feb, 2012
68 Ballina Street
Lennox Head
NSW Australia
Posted in Eco Events, eco living, gifts, sustainable fashion
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Eco Xmas Gift Ideas for kids under $30
Oh my goodness – Where has the year gone?. We are only 6 weeks away from Xmas – Yikes! About two weeks ago the Xmas wrapping requests started rolling in at State of Green’s online store. We have been busy wrapping gifts and posting them off to some incredibly organised customers, who are hiding them away until the big reveal on December 25. As you put your mind towards thinking about presents, we have put together a list of gifts for kids under $30 that are planet friendly, useful AND fun!
Eco Kids Gifts under $35
1. Calico Bags – Use for kinder, library visits & trips to the grandparents – $4.95
2. Bamboo E-Racer – Come on – we’ll race you! – $19.90 (On Sale)
3. Reusable Lunch & Snack bags (no more plastic wrap!!) – $12.95 – $14.95
4. Stainless Steel Drink Bottles (BPA free) – $21.95-$28.95
5. The World is Wonder Full (BPA free) plate – $18.95
6. Reusable Coffee/Hot Chocolate/Babycino Cups!(one for all ages!) – $10.95-$16.95
7. Recycled cardboard Totem Butterfly Model – $26.95
9. Recycled cardboard Dragonrock castle with 12 non toxic Textas $19.95
10. Va Va Vroom Race car coloured with vegetable based dyes $24.95 (on sale!)
We hope we have given you a few ideas! Over the coming weeks we will put together a few more Xmas gift suggestions posts, as we have some fab new products instore. Enjoy the lead up to the silly season!
Posted in Eco Events, gifts
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GIVEAWAY: Planks by Green Hat Workshop appeal across generations
What type of present do you buy for kids at Xmas time? Do you go for the whirring, spinning and flashing toys that chomp through batteries but excite kids no end. Or do you focus on toys that inspire imaginative play and get little brains thinking and analyzing. Planks falls into the latter category, and the kind creators from Green Hat Workshop are offering up a Box of 100 – perfect timing for Xmas!
Box of 100, 200 and 500 Planks!
No shaky hand placement there!
What may look like a simple concept, is in fact pure genius. Long slender pieces of plain timber are used as building blocks to construct anything you like. And it WILL appeal to all ages. The planks are perfect for little fingers learning to stack and knock down. A few years down the track, the same fingers will be constructing forts, trains, fairy houses and more. As teens and adults join the throng, wondrous architectural and sophisticated forms will take shape.
Defying the laws of physics - now that's just showing off!
To see the Planks in person, you can visit the Magnolia Square Market at St Kilda Town Hall in Melbourne THIS weekend (Fri evening – Sunday) where they will be exhibiting…..OR…..you can enter the giveaway below!
++ GIVEAWAY DETAILS ++
To be in the running to win a box of 100 Planks, just show Green Hat Workshop a little love by liking their Facebook page AND leave a comment below. The winner will be drawn at random on Wednesday 16 November 2011 after 7pm. (Australian entrants only).
Posted in Competition/Giveaway, eco baby + child, gifts
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Odds & Ends have it all stitched up with reclaimed materials.
Do you love plants but manage to kill everything left in your care? Andrea Daniel of Odds&endS may have the perfect solution for you. Her plant range looks good, requires no watering, they withstand extremes of temperature, never wilt and are not plastic! Too good to be true, you say? Okay, whilst the cacti plants are not real, they look close to the real thing, although a lot cuddlier than the real version!
Just last year, Andrea Daniels launched Odds&endS, a craft label devoted to traditional crafting techniques utilising antique and reclaimed materials. In addition to her signature cacti pieces, Andrea also creates some very friendly looking soft toys and patchwork blankets crafted from old pullovers made pure wool, cashmere and mohair jumpers.
Trained in Industrial design and holding a BA in Fashion Design, Andrea works part-time in the fashion industry, in addition to running Odds&endS. Between juggling both occupations, Andrea kindly spared a few moments to share with us a little further insight into Odds&endS:
1. What inspired you to start Odds and Ends? I have trained in Design (Fashion and Industrial Design) and always been a self-confessed craft lover. What started as a hobby making soft toys and cacti for friends, lead to participation in some design markets, which then developed into private and retail orders. Odds&endS was initially about finding inspiration in my large collection of vintage textiles, to create unique handmade products.
2. Who inspires you? My family are a wonderful support and encourage me to keep up the work involved in running a label. Creatively, I admire Ray and Charles Eames for their whimsical sense of design, coupled with their beautiful appreciate for form and function. If I had one wish, it would be to visit their home case house study #8 – so amazing!
3. What are your favourite pieces? In my collection of Odds&endS, I do love to make the knitted cacti. I never expected for a product concept to literally evolve the way that it has. I have to giggle when I find myself gravitating towards the landscaping magazines and botanical journals when I am at the Newsagent.
Beautiful original 1950's pots in "The Vintage Collection"
4. What does a typical day at Odds & Ends involve? No two days working on Odds&endS are the same. I try to vary my work tasks each day, but guaranteed there is always lots of knitting and hand sewing to complete! Over time I have worked out ways of streamlining my practices, so generally I will work away at one task at a time. For example, I will spend a morning on knitting, afternoon sewing and then preparing/cutting pattern pieces for the soft toys/blanket collections. Evenings are great for administration and time for online marketing….I love blogging, and reading other design blogs!
5. What can we expect to see from Odds & Ends over the next twelve months? I am very excited about Odds&endS expanding into new product categories in the coming year. I hope to launch a stationary and illustration collection in collaboration with my sister Renee who has a background in printmaking and design. I also have some exciting exhibition proposals in the making…expect to see some larger than life knitted cacti!!
6. Share with us your easy eco living tip: I love thrift shopping, and where possible buy preloved over new. There is so much character in a vintage piece and often the quality and craftsmanship exceeds the fast mass production products of recent times.
Thanks Andrea!
Posted in eco baby + child, gifts, Interviews
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Reusable Coffee Cups have never looked so good!
How many takeaway coffee cups do you go through a day? Now times that by 365 (give or take) and that gives you the approximate number of cups you turf into the bin each year. Add your colleagues and the many other coffee drinkers to the mix, and the number of cups going to landfill each year becomes mind blowing! If you are already a reusable coffee cup convert, that’s great! If not, there are some great reusable coffee cup designs out there that baristas around Australia are happy to fill. The latest addition to the list is the new double walled porcelain beaker designed by Penny Smith of Painted Perception.
Double walled reusable porcelain coffee cup with silicon lid
Possessing a particular penchant for porcelain, Penny Smith sourced craftsmen in Jingdezhen, China to make these exquisite reusable coffee cups – for those of you not familiar with this town, it is internationally renowned for the high quality porcelain it produces dating back to 1700. Adding an Australian flavour to the design is one of our largest birds, the Powerful Owl (Ninox Strenna) and the cute little Blue Wren (Malurus Cyaneus). We think these beakers are an ever so stylish take on the reusable coffee cup, and there’s that je ne sais quoi factor about drinking from fine porcelain (beats waxy paper any day!) – makes the cuppa taste just that little bit better.
Now available at STATE OF GREEN ! $29.95
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New stock arriving …and we are a little in love with it!
It’s time to share with you some of the new eco friendly products we are getting in-store at State of Green! For the kids we have a great range of products that have multiple functions! Cute wall hooks for kids bedrooms are great for hanging clothes, displaying their precious jewellery collection or putting away the kids kinder and school bags. Retro inspired eco-ply money boxes double as a money saving device and act as functional bookend holders too. And last but not least blocks made from sustainable rubberwood have had a modern makeover, with see through rainbow coloured sides that also double as sound shakers, and patterns and swirls to challenge young (and old) minds or simply stack upon one another!
Adults don’t miss out either – Hand thrown porcelain comes in whimsical new shapes. Hanging test-tubes vases straight out of science class now act as unique hanging vases perfect for that freshly plucked flower. Grandma’s old Hanging planters are transformed into modern facetted hanging trays. Birds have never had it so good in their own porcelain bird house complete with timber perch roof. Turning inside out, little delicate creamers and tripot stands feature a flash on internal glazed colour against tactile unglazed exteriors. And finally, sustainable Moso bamboo table and kitchenware is simply a joy to hold in hand.
We do hope you enjoy our new range – And this is just the start of it ……
Posted in eco baby + child, eco living, gifts
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Post your wine in The Traveller
In the Australian vernacular, “to take a traveller” refers to taking an alcoholic beverage with you when you leave a venue – to be consumed on your way to the next destination. Well, now there is a new traveller on the block: The Traveller.
Lisa Oaten and Claire Selby of Melbourne design firm, Studio Periscope, have recently developed a smart and safe packaging solution for sending gifts of plonk to your friends and loved ones. Using 95% recycled board, the hexagonal shaped box is printed in a range of modern prints that doubles as wrapping paper AND includes a space to write your note. Now that’s one nifty design! We particularly love the bold candy stripes and iconic Melbourne themed prints on these hexagonal boxes – Scenes include Federation Square to the Forum, Southern Cross Station, and our native gumnuts.
Although a bit frightening to say, with Christmas just around the corner, we think The Traveller may just provide many of us with one very cool and convenient gift solution.
Studio Periscope are happy to take custom orders for company branding, or you can purchase one of their designs by the dozen for $72 direct from their website.
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GIVEAWAY: Wrapped By House Mouse
The award winning Melbourne based design studio House Mouse, have it all wrapped up when it comes to designing and printing eco friendly paper products. In addition to their design consultancy, directors and grahic designers Nancy Bugeja and Miguel Valenzuela design a funky range of eco friendly wrapping paper that will make you say WOW even before you open the present, and they are kindly giving away a set of their range to a State of Green reader!
Apart from the stand out design, the Wrapped by House Mouse range has a wonderful designer tactile feel – Printed with vegetable ink onto uncoated recycled paper it does not possess that glossy plastic look of many other wrapping papers. House Mouse go that extra step in earning environmental design points by using a printing company who use wind and hydro power, making this range attractive in SO many ways.
The Wrapped by House Mouse range is available in three colours: Orange typography “Wrapped in Type; Cyan Symbols and Magenta Symbols.
More than just a wrapping paper, we think Wrapped by House Mouse would look great as poster art (841mm x 594mm) on your wall, and if you’re brave enough a dress too! (see below)
++GIVEAWAY: SET OF WRAPPED BY HOUSE MOUSE WRAPPING PAPER++
To go in the running to win a set (3 pieces) of the Wrapped by House Mouse Range please pop on over to the Wrapped by House Mouse Facebook and “Like” their page, AND leave a comment on our blog below letting us know what you would do with the set!
Winner will be drawn at random on Monday 30 May 2011 after 7pm.
Posted in Competition/Giveaway, eco awards, eco brands, gifts, stationery
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ebay Green Team – Taking ebay to greener levels?
Most of us are familiar with eBay, however how many of you have heard of eBay Green Team? I must admit I’ve been meaning to find out more about this for a while now and am glad have finally got there! At first I wasn’t clear how “Green eBay” was different from regular eBay – Aren’t most things second hand or vintage on eBay? Well, it always helps to dig a little deeper.
Green eBay was launched in 2007 by a small group of eBay employees who wanted to make buying and selling on eBay as green as possible . Their mission was “to inspire the world to buy, sell and think green every day.” Fast forward to 2011 and green eBay now has more than 2400 employees and has attracted close to 300,000 green members.
You won’t find any plastic toys, nylon sheets or the latest Nintendo on Green Ebay. Instead, you can happily shop knowing your purchase will be either upcycled, recycled, made from natural ingredients or save energy and other resources. A quick glance at the site reveals items ranging from energy efficient TV’s and light bulbs, vintage clothing and organic duvet covers.
Whilst Green ebay is very much American focused, it does provide some good ideas on how to sell and buy products that helps to conserve our resources. Their reusable and recyclable box program aims to get at least 5 re-uses out of the one box. By simply reusing the box a number of times, it is estimated 4000 trees are protected, 2.4 million gallons of water saved and energy to at least 69 homes a year conserved!
It is worthwhile to head on over to the website for a peak – if not just to see the initiatives being undertaken by the ebay Green Team with other organisations (such as recycling electronic goods) or to read green activist Anna Getty’s Top ten tips for living in style!. So head on over to Green ebay and let us know what you think!
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