Eco-Friendly & Green Living Blog

Pump up the volume on sustainability – Magno’s AM/FM two-tone Wooden Radios are made with love (of the earth!) and a commitment to building sustainable jobs and forestry in Indonesia.

Based out of the small Indonesian village of Kandangan, the man behind Magno, Singgih S. Kartono, builds sustainable industry through carpentry and craft – the radios are made by farm labourers-cum-craftsmen in communities hit hard by declining agriculture.

Kartono fights for forests by raising community awareness (for example, by starting a tree-planting program with the local high school by making his radios with only locally harvested new-growth wood, and replanting every tree used by Magno).

“As a wood consumer, I feel morally responsible for replacing the wood I’ve used,” Kartono says. “Currently, Kandangan has almost no forest land. The population is about 4,000 people. If we were to employ the whole population of Kandangan, we would abolish unemployment but most important, for every [person] we employ, we’d generate more woods through our forest regeneration programs.”

Pairing retro charm with social and environmental sustainability, these radios are playing my tune!

Available at: www.ministryoftheinterior.net

Price: $235 small (5 x 7.5 x 3.75″), $295 medium (7.5 x 7.5 x 4.25″), $352 large (7.5 x 12.25 x 4.25″)

More Information: www.magno-design.com

Whoever would have thought they would make a flashlight out of wood! And not only is it made out of beech wood, it has an LED light, too.

It would make an awesome present! Battery-operated. – Guest poster Shelby Webster

Price: approx. $53

Available at: www.anthropologie.com

Follow me on Twitter!

Do you have a pretty product you’d like to recommend for this blog? Email me at naturalchic@styleathome.com!

I have this thing for wooden bowls. I have yet to buy one, but I’ve been on the lookout ever since I spotted one at a B&B I stayed at in Ireland and realized how fantastic they are. Since then I’ve searched high and low for the perfect specimen.

I’ve driven my sister Candy nuts during a trip to Italy examining olivewood bowls minutely in every store we came across. Unfortunately, none were exactly what I wanted. This one was too pink, that one had too many brown streaks. The other day, I spent at least an hour staring at bowls in a shop. I think the store owner thought I was nuts, especially when I walked out empty-handed.

The other day I stumbled across Laura Yeats’s website. Yeats is a Seattle artist who started out in urban design and got sidetracked by an interest in woodworking and welding. She now specializes in finding dead, diseased or unwanted wood and works magic with it.

She does make smaller bowls, but I fell in love her large Madrona side bowl. A 20-1/2 by 9-1/2 inch beauty, it’s just what I want and would be perfect on its own or for displaying food or other beautiful collectibles. Alas, the price is just too high for my pocketbook. The search continues…

Available at: www.laurayeats.com

Price: $1,800.00 US