Remember when everyone was clamoring to be the new Martha? Instead of just one uber-maven of the domestic and decorative arts, we’ve seen a whole plethora of talented designers, chefs, sustainable lifestyle guides, and experts come to the fore with aesthetic gifts and business smarts.

In the design realm, Kim Parker is one of the best. A classically trained musician turned textile designer, Parker aims to help you create an “interior garden” with her graphic, modern floral pillows, rugs, dinnerware, fabrics and prints.


Kim Parker Home offers a window into the design process - she improvises with water-based paints, and the freedom and joy of her method are evident in the results - and are completely contagious. Parker also makes brilliant and liberal use of flea-market finds, recovering, reclaiming and boldly mixing cultures and eras. This book is a must-have if you love intoxicating, pretty floral print and textile design, if you’re looking for inspiration for flea-market and thrift-shop decorating, or if you simply enjoy reading about how successful artists find their creative spark and thrive.

The handmade revolution is showing up everywhere, and Etsy is its most concentrated virtual village, with more than 100,000 artists, artisans and crafters setting up shop on the site.

Now a team of Etsy sellers dedicated to reducing, reusing and recycling have created EcoEtsy to make it easier to identify and link directly to their Etsy wares. The EcoEtsy team has its own blog, as well as links to seller blogs and a Flickr group. A quick browse through the EcoEtsy team’s offerings reveals amazing ingenuity and variety. I like this accent pillow made from a vintage tea towel and organic cotton fabric, these custom journals made from vintage book covers, and this pocket mirror with a vintage children's book image on the case. Remember that Etsy is a global community, so always check the point of origin before buying if you're concerned about shipping long distances.  

Feeling creative, ambitious and disciplined? Take the Wardrobe Refashion pledge for a minimum of two months. Wardrobe Refashion is a recurring virtual club of people dedicated to reusing and refashioning instead of buying new garments, founded and hosted by the effervescent Nikki, Head Refashionista, on her blog.

The next round begins in July, and you can sign up after June 15, where you can also read the pledge and rules. If the idea of not buying anything new fills you with anxiety, note that Wardrobe Refashion does allow you to buy handmade clothing and grants you one Get Out of Refashionista Jail Free Card for every two-month period.

Nikki also asks that you post on the Wardrobe Refashion blog once a week to update the group on your progress. The project is definitely in fun, but also serious about using what you have and what you can creatively source before buying new. In a world where we’ve given up so much self-sufficiency, this will test you and strengthen your sustainability muscles, and you'll find a virtual group of like-minded friends to inspire and support you.

Image: Jaci Berkopec

It seems the whole world is trading in industrial, factory-made conformity for artisan style. “Many of the pieces at this year’s International Contemporary Furniture Fair . . .felt more artisanal than manufactured,” wrote the New York Times on May 22. So, how do you get the look without breaking the bank? Just as you can build a wardrobe based on great neutral basics and unique accessories, you can build a home with strong, well-made neutral furniture enhanced by artisan pieces you love.

Natural materials and multicultural influences are a starting point for the artisan home, and while sophisticated artisan style can be eclectic and loaded with character and color, you'll want to avoid anything too crafty or homemade-ish. Here, easy ways to add the artisan look to your décor:

Rugs. Whether you opt for traditional Oriental-style rugs or contemporary designs, rugs add instant drama, color and pattern. Look for handmade natural fibers and make sure you're buying from a company with the highest ethical labor standards (look for the Rugmark designation on design companies like Odegard or support a socially responsible, fair trade-focused nonprofit like Arzu Rugs).

Glass. Glass can add color and light to your home in many forms: contemporary stained glass, mosaics, or blown glass accents. Art glass is collectable; focus on a color or style. Look for local glass artists or shop online from well-known studios like Orient & Flume of Chico, Calif.

Textiles. Pillows, throws, table linens, quilts and wall art - these are some of the ways you can use artisan textiles to add texture, color and tactile beauty to your home. Look for handwoven fabrics, traditional or contemporary quilts, or currently fashionable hand-knit home accents in chunky yarns of organic or hand-dyed wool or cotton.

Ceramics. Functional ceramics -  dinnerware, vases - or ceramic art pieces add earthiness and substance to your room. Handmade artisan tile can be incorporated into a kitchen splash, or individual tiles can be used as trivets or accent pieces.

Stone. Stone can be part of the “bones” of your home, with a flagstone floor or a stone fireplace. If that isn’t an option, stone accents such as these towel hooks and spa mats from EcoSalon sponsor VivaTerra can bring the cool, clean, timeless quality of

Image: *susie*

How important is good lighting in your life? I can’t live without it for working, reading, creating and illuminating the world, so I love finding well-designed, interesting lamps. Here There Designs makes gorgeous lamps and lighting fixtures that are, in their words, “100% non-toxic, 100% recyclable, and 100% archival . . . which is to say built to last.”

I say they’re also completely beautiful, with organic, tactile shapes that look almost soft and squishy, but are made of thin shells of molded abaca fiber, a plant fiber also known as Manila hemp. The lamp bases are steel set in concrete. These lamps have an artisan feel and an elegant but unusual style that would enhance almost any décor. View products online and call to order, or visit the New York showroom of this San Francisco-based company.

- via Kristen Andersen’s Exquisite: Conscious Style and Living

Gardens are magical places, especially in spring. Plants shoot through the ground, flowers bloom, and birds add music and share in the abundance. Why not make your garden super-friendly to birds by giving them a lovely eco-home?

Artist Carol Garringer, of Eugene, Ore., is the creative force behind The Artisan’s Garden, specializing in original birdhouses made with reclaimed and vintage materials. Garringer grew up on a bird superhighway - a major migratory route in the Midwest - and now uses years of woodworking, mosaic and art skills to create homes for many species, using salvaged wood, vintage lighting fixtures and chandelier pieces, and even lids from old pots.

Garringer’s Web site offers tips on choosing the right style of birdhouse for your garden, with small or large lid, temple, rustic and privy-style choices; she also can design a custom birdhouse just for you. I love the weathered temple-style houses, at $55, designed for small birds like chickadees and wrens.

Garringer is also designing a line of bird feeders for sale later this year. 

Strong, versatile, highly renewable hemp fiber can truly be a “straw into gold” story in the hands of a talented textile artist and designer like Anne Kirk of San Francisco.

Anne Kirk Textiles specializes in custom hand-dyed and handprinted fabrics for interiors, and while all of her natural-fiber fabrics are gorgeous, her “Diamonds” pattern on 100% hemp truly outdoes any hemp fabrics I’ve seen. The pattern is sophisticated and modern yet has an old-world decorative feel, and the hemp base means the fiber required minimal or no chemicals on the farm. Anne Kirk Textiles was named Best Custom Fabric by San Francisco Magazine in 2004's Best of the Bay Area issue; her scale of production ranges from a few yards for a lucky homeowner to 2,000 yards of hand-painted muslin for the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas.  

Last month, concerns about hormone-disrupting plastics leaching into food and posing very real risks, especially to children, finally reached critical mass. (And if you somehow missed the news, this excellent article from DISCOVER magazine will bring you up to speed). A few intrepid scientist-ecologists have been giving us plenty of warning for years, however, about plastics, pesticides and other toxins.

Among them, Sandra Steingraber, now a professor at Ithaca College, is one of the most thoughtful and eloquent environmentalists we have. Living Downstream: A Scientist’s Personal Investigation of Cancer and The Environment published in 1997, blends her poetic writing gifts with rigorous scientific discipline to sound an alarm as poignant as Rachel Carson’s was in the 1960s.

Steingraber’s next book, Having Faith, detailed her quest to have a healthy child after recovering from cancer – and after learning all that she’d learned about environmental toxins. Both books will enhance your understanding of ecological dangers, why they’re so ubiquitous and hard to regulate, and why it’s so critical to do whatever we can to mitigate them for our children. Yes, you’ll want to stop heating food in plastic containers and recommit to eating organic foods – and realize that everyone on the planet needs to have those options.

Short on time? Visit Organic Valley's Web site to read Sandra’s essay, The Organic Manifesto of a Biologist Mother.

My American friends living in Germany always comment on how noticeably green the country is; there’s recycling everywhere, organic food is a significant part of the food market, and everybody participates in environmental responsibility as a matter of course. Now hessnatur, one of Germany’s most highly regarded organic and sustainable clothing companies is launching a U.S. division with a dedicated Web site arriving this summer, followed by a mail-order catalog with styles for women, infants and children.

Hessnatur initiated the world’s first organic cotton farming project in Egypt in 1991, according to the company, and they've been making cool organic clothes ever since for lucky Europeans. They’re known for serious social as well as environmental responsibility, with a fair trade and ethical labor program in place. Fashion star Miguel Adrover is newly hired as creative director for the U.S. launch, so look for some great street-informed sustainable style. You can sign up today to receive the charter catalog at hess-natur.com.