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As the Duchess of Sussex opts for organic colours for the royal nursery, Anna Clarke finds ways to give your house a ‘greenover’
Mmost of us have got the memo about recycling plastic and Veganuary, but there’s always someone, somewhere, who will be going a bit further to virtue signal their ecocredentials. Step forward, Duchess of Sussex, who has taken the quest for clean living one step further by reportedly decorating her nursery at Frogmore Cottage on the Queen’s Windsor estate with “vegan paint”.
Isn’t all paint vegan, you might ask? Not quite: many household paints use milk or beeswax as a binder, with some tested on animals before they are declared safe for human homes.
Enlisting the help of designer Vicky Charles, the Duchess has opted for a vegan, odourless, non-toxic “eco paint” from the Organic and Natural Paint Co. She is also said to be installing a £50,000 eco boiler in an apparent bid to make her home one of the greenest around.
So there you go; while you might well be giving yourself a pat on the back for dutifully plonking your recyclable goods into the correct bin and using a sustainable cup for your coffee each morning, there is always more that you can be doing.
Here’s our handy list of how to take a (green) leaf out of Meghan’s book and embark on an eco-chic revamp for your home and garden.
Bee bricks
Twitter was all abuzz recently when Adam Cormack, of the Wildlife Trust, posted a picture of the ingenious new brick he’d installed in his Nottinghamshire property just six months earlier.
The building block, which looks much like a regular brick, has additional little holes for bees to nest in and make a home. And with nearly 1 in 10 of Europe’s wild bee species facing extinction, according to Friends of the Earth, bee hotels like this one will help to combat declining bee populations.
“Without rich biodiversity we’re in very serious trouble, that’s becoming very clear,” says Faye Clifton, spokesman for Green&blue, the creators of the bee brick. “Here’s a kind of simple thing that you can do that could make a real difference.”
The innovative measure is intended to house solitary bees, including red mason and leafcutter bees, which lay their eggs inside the holes, then partition it with chewed up mud or leaves. “It’s a very simple measure that you can use in place of a standard brick or block in a building, either in a house wall or in a garden wall or even freestanding.”
And there’s no need to be concerned about unwanted house guests; the hole cavities are only moulded part of the way in.
Living larders
What with the great swathes of people keenly turning to plant-based diets – 225,000 having signed up to Veganuary this month – it’s no surprise to hear that living larders are the buzz word of the day. Gardeners everywhere are replacing perennial plants – indoors and out – with vegetable walls that take up very little room and keep you in quick supply. Herbs, tomatoes or strawberries are all edibles that work well in this set-up and are a great choice for space-poor millennials, who can use them to maximise tiny flat balconies or paltry gardens.
“Mini salad gardens of raised beds or broad pots filled with herbs and leaves such as corn salad [provide] ultra fresh produce and produce a minimal carbon footprint in the process too,” suggests Guy Barter, chief horticulturist at the Royal Horticultural Society.
Plant art
And it doesn’t stop there either – botanical art is also helping to bring even more of the outdoors into our homes. Having more greenery around us, in our everyday lives, can be really beneficial to our health and wellbeing.
“Many plants are air purifying – even a view of green spaces is good for us,” says Chloe Bullock, a British Institute of Interior Design expert and a specialist in ethical design.
Companies like Urban Planters are creating plant paintings using preserved moss in various shades of green. Not only do they make for pretty designs, they are also low maintenance and great natural noise absorbers. Plus, they are much less costly than installing a whole living wall.
Eco paints
The Duchess of Sussex isn’t the first to opt for ethical paints, it turns out. Coating your walls in a new lick of paint can end up being a dizzying business, leaving you to throw open the windows as the overwhelming fumes take hold. The noxious wafts come from the toxic volatile organic compounds, or VOCS, and although from 2010 onwards, new EU directives have helped to reduce them in our paint pots, there’s still a little way to go. But water-based alternatives, low in VOCS or solvent free, are an easy swap. Crown’s Breathe Easy emulsion range is reportedly 99 per cent solvent free and even trendy Farrow & Ball does an eco version now.
Consider ethical brands, too. “If avoiding animal tested paint is important to you, cruelty-free options at all price points are available – do your research,” suggests Bullock.
Material benefits
It’s a dilemma for any house-proud vegan: how do you ensure that all your blankets and throws are totally free of animal cruelty? Interior-design duo Jordan Cluroe and Russell Whitehead, aka 2LG Studio, think they have the answer. Both became vegan recently, and their passion for cruelty-free living has crossed over into their work.
Their recent collaboration with Love Your Home produced a furniture range featuring ethical cotton velvets and cotton/linen bouclé fabrics. They have also designed a workspace using materials such as cork and recycled plastic, and a leather-look cushion made from pineapple-leaf fibre. “Pineapple ‘leather’ is an example of a material that has been developed from waste but is still beautiful,” says Whitehead. The pair insist that vegan-friendly options can look as stunning as traditional ones. “It’s about looking for good alternatives.”
Home scents
For houses that smell as good as they look, vegan-friendly candles are a good alternative to those made from paraffin wax or beeswax. Earl of East London’s range is made from soy wax with cotton wicks. The founders, Niko Dafkos and Paul Firmin, believe good design should go hand in hand with animal-friendly products: “We don’t use the words ‘crueltyfree’ as we assume and believe it shouldn’t be any other way.”
Recycled decking
If you’re already looking towards summer, and thinking of upgrading your garden, composite decking is a brilliant, eco-friendly option. It makes great use of old materials that would normally be heading straight to landfill by recycling old plastics and repurposing them into a beautiful new outdoor deck. Happily, it’s also low maintenance because they require little upkeep and are splinter-free.