november-2010

AGENDA
eco
At one with nature:
Oliver Heath's eco chic
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 fi xes.
"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 windsurfi ng 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 landfi ll.
Draught-proofi ng – 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 fi replaces.
Light bulbs – switching to low-energy bulbs
will cut your energy bills by a sixth if you’re
still using a traditional 60W bulb.
///NEED TO KNOW
26 Brussels Airlines b.there! magazine November 2010
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 fl ow 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 fi ve minutes less each
day you'll be saving all year. Keep windows dows
clean and free of obstruction, and
maximize natural light by bouncing it
off mirrors and white surfaces.
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 oliverheath.com
A new book and design agency off ers easy
solutions for creating a chic yet green home
Green shoots:
reducing our carbon
footprint is vital for life
Clean living?
The choices we make in our daily
activities contribute to greenhouse gas
emissions and infl uence 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 dayto-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)
Curious about your
impact on the planet?
To calculate your carbon footprint, visit
Brussels Airlines partner co2logic.com