The next Martha Stewart of the Green Movement...
by Joey Roth, Brooklyn, USA 
on 07.26.07
Is Martha herself. According to The Eightfold,
"Martha should pull an Al Gore to become the icon for "creative conservation". She could be a platform for all the geek chic energy out there to use art and design to encourage sustainability and could transform conservation from cheap to chic for the masses."
I think Eightfold's on to something; I've argued before that getting away from a specifically green aesthetic - earth tones, blatantly recycled composites, hemp and unfinished bamboo, etc.- should be a goal for designers, as this aesthetic expectation prevents green design from becoming, simply, design. If Martha Stewart took up the mantle of green icon, a huge swath of people who are turned off by the hipster DIY ethos, yet love very similar projects when they're framed within the trope of creative homemaking, could become converts.
The Eightfold says she's already most of the way there: "
It’s not your cultural footprint. In reading your magazines and watching your show, you have a precision and energy that only comes from devotion to one’s art. It’s this unadulterated love of creation — not simply your aesthetic — which inspires people. It’s this love that can and should be harnessed to help the world."
Hugg link: http://www.hugg.com/story/Dear-Martha-Stewart-World-Needs-You-Will-You-Answer/
Follow @TreeHugger on Twitter & get our headlines with @TH_rss!
Thirsty for more? Check out these related articles:
- The Week's Best DIY Projects: June 5-June 11
- The Week's Best DIY Projects: June 12-June 18
- The Week's Best DIY Projects: May 29-June 4, 2009
- French Pressed Coffee: A Surprisingly Green Luxury, On the Cheap
- Meet Change Maker Christopher Raeburn of Raeburn Design
- The Week's Best DIY Projects: May 22-28, 2009
Martha could be good for recycling. I'm imagining articles and show segments on creative uses for... your moving boxes, wrapping paper scraps, those pesky plastic bags, all sorts of things. It could work.
Though I was actually just looking online at Martha Stewart home products- not an organic cotton or bamboo towel or sheetset in sight. She'd have a ways to go to be green.
The impact of Martha going green would be *enormous*---she rules over myriad eponymous brands, including Martha Stewart Flowers, Martha Stewart Crafts, Martha Stewart Paints, Martha Stewart Furniture, Martha Stewart Everyday at Kmart---and she's just launched another line of home and kitchen goods at Macy's, as well as her own Flor tiles.
Imagine the ripple effect if she promoted sustainability and social responsibility---the very idea of it is making my head swim.
Martha taught me how to compost! I used to get her magazine 15 years ago, when I was in grade school, she's a wonderful green icon!
Yeah, she's already green, although she hasn't tested the waters for organic cotton yet. Her new farm, Cantitoe, is designed all around self-sufficiency.
And she made sure all the livestock were matching black!
http://marthamoments.blogspot.com/2006_05_01_archive.html
Anything is possible. She would need to reformat her magazine to nix the perfume ads. Perfume is not a sustainable or healthy product. Maybe then she could print with soy ink and tree-free paper with no blow-ins. Blow-ins waster paper. Better yet an e-version. The best magazine is one that does not need to be printed or mailed.