Eco-chic

Angela Murrills, The Georgia Straight May 24, 2007

Furniture that's good for Mother Earth? That's a lot to expect, but responsibly sourced materials, low-chemical components, and a little foresight can lessen the impact.

Abandoned bookcases and futon frames are as much a part of Vancouver back-lane décor as dinged and dented shopping carts. Their destiny is inevitably the landfill, where the wood will be wasted and the toxic chemicals will leach into Mother Earth. But not if some Vancouver companies have their way. Going beyond recycling old timber, they're taking a hard look at how headboards and sofas are put together, making them more eco-friendly from the ground up.

Shelley Penner of Penner & Associates Interior Design describes the company's newest venture, a line of green residential furniture and accessories launched in May (available through www.pafurniture.ca, 604-255-2049), as "an effort to try to transform the marketplace". Describing it as "a sustainable range that still has a fairly high aesthetic", Penner says, "The reason we're moving away from custom is we can bring costs down. People either have IKEA or environmental options that are cost-prohibitive. We're trying to meet this middle market." Certainly, the initial pieces in the collection have broad appeal. Clean, sleek, and modernist, they would be as at home in a Main Street heritage house as in a Yaletown loft. But it's their composition that really sets them apart. Among other elements, designs incorporate FSC–certified (Forest Stewardship Council) veneers and solid wood, low-VOC stains and finishes, and natural, renewable materials like wool and hemp. Even the packaging is designed to be reusable.

Environmental concern has been fundamental for Penner since 1992, when she founded the EcoDesign Resource Society. Originally from Winnipeg, she moved to the West Coast where "natural resources were more apparent and compelling. But putting idealism into practice has been challenging up until recently," Penner explains. Only in the past decade have manufacturers begun to provide, for instance, FSC–certified veneer core plywood. It still contains urea formaldehyde, but companies are working to find "no-added formaldehyde" binders; Penner knows of one that has already succeeded.

Design also contributes to sustainability. Modular design lets the furniture line be reconfigured, or repainted, according to need: the front panels of a headboard for a child's room can go from princess pink to subversive black as the years go by. Next on the agenda are wool area rugs and wool-topped natural-latex mattresses with organic-cotton ticking and eventually, mass production of green products. With this kind of thinking, Penner says, "you're connecting to a value system."

Creative director and president of Upholstery Arts (2430 Burrard Street), Len Laycock admits that, like many, he had been tracking environmental issues for years. The tipping point came in spring 2005 when he noticed his 10-year-old son looked bothered. Laycock delved, and his son told him he was afraid the world was going to end. "It was an emotional punch in the stomach," Laycock says. "The epiphany that millions of kids have the same thought. I was in that awkward stage of knowing and not acting. The very next day I thought, 'I'm not going to wait for legislation.'"

Today, Laycock says, the UA Green line of upholstered furniture makes UA "the greenest upholstery company on Planet Earth. What irritates me now is greenwashing. We're doing a deep green process." Lumber is environmentally certified; glues, stains, and finishes are all nontoxic; and padding is made of wool and natural latex rather than polyurethane foam with its carcinogenic petroleum-based chemicals. "Maybe in some small way we can be an example for others. I want my competitors to feel uncomfortable and inadequate." These sofas are never going to end up in any back alley. Laycock says that once they've outlived their usefulness, you can compost them to grow your tomatoes.