All The Best Sustainability Tips We Have!
Save on plastic and food waste, and general single-use items. Starting now.
Image by@mondomondo_
If you’ve been thinking about how you can live more sustainably, especially considering how f-ed the world seems right now, we have a few practical ideas. These simple swaps (as recommended in both Season 1 and 2 of Highly Enthused, are you all caught up? Go on!) immediately save on plastic and food waste, or general single-use items. Even if you just change one thing, isn’t it better than nothing? You can do it!
SEASON ONE
SM:
If your pooch poops as much as mine, you’re probably using like… three dog poop bags a day. Oh Crap biodegradable Dog Poop Bags are made from cornstarch! They’re awesome.
Try a Book Swap instead of half-committing to a book club. ZERO pressure, you just bring a book you like and want to pass on. We all usually explain why we brought the book we chose, and then just drink wine.
Buy bars of soap instead of bottles of body wash! No plastic! So simple it feels dumb to say!
SR:
I made a resolution to shop secondhand more! Obsessed with Instagram vintage sellers like @luciazolea, @waywardcollection and @subrinaheyinkvintage
EMAIL YOUR POLITICIANS ABOUT CLIMATE CHANGE ACTION NOW. Here’s a link to Scott Morrison’s contact page, if you need it.
Don’t be caught out buying a bunch of summer peaches and no reusable bag to carry them! Grab a Net Baggu bag - comes in two colours.
SEASON TWO
SM:
Try a menstrual cup. Hopefully you’ll have more luck than SM did with the Hello Menstrual cup from NZ, made from medical grade plastic that is fully recyclable and will last you YEARS. A lot of listeners have liked the Diva Cup, which is sold at Woolworths. Women use on average 9,120 tampons over her lifetime of cycles. Think about that.
Follow @haleboyd on insta for sustainability tips. She’s the founder of Marais shoes, but is fabulous to follow because she’s on a FULL sustainability crusade in a very chic way, if that’s a thing. She has all these little tips and tricks about using less packaging, sustainable fashion and sustainable travel.
Big Little Brushes are bamboo toothbrushes, and are especially great not only on the no-plastic front, but because profits are used to help fund primary health programs in remote Indigenous communities in Australia.
Try going on a shopping ban for three months! You’ll save heaps of money, and will probably re-frame the way you think about impulse purchases. Let us know how you go!
Studio Tinta is a really gorgeous fabric brand in Newcastle selling hand-dyed textiles such as silk, linen, hemp and organic cotton. The fabrics are dyed using colours Katie makes from plants around where she lives, whether it’s vegetable and fruit such as avocado stones, onion skins or acorns and rose petals and eucalyptus leaves. I love her Natural dye Market Tote.
Hunt down Telling Time Vintage for highly curated secondhand accessories such as bags and necklaces, awesome T-shirts, indigo denim jackets, cute little folk blouses and college Ts.
Need new furniture but don’t want to leave your old stuff on the street? Take part in Ikea’s buyback scheme.
If you don’t have a garden, the Bokashi is a great small, non-stinky compost system.
SR
Girlfriend Collective workout gear is all made from post-consumer recycled plastic bottles. They actually have a great run through on their website on their manufacturing cycle. One of their ranges is made from recycled fishing nets!
Eliminate single-use plastic from your kitchen, laundry and bathroom by supporting the Zero & Co Kickstarter, which was actually the most-funded kickstarter of 2019! Great to see such an uptake.
Grab some Toko Eco bambu rounds for make-up/nail polish removing, and be done with disposable cotton rounds forever.
TWO GREAT LISTENER RECOMMENDATIONS:
Jane & Gabi from Insta both recommended the Ethique World Solid Shampoo Bars. Nix those plastic bottles you have to buy over and over.
Lizzie recommended Positive Waste. Collect your kitchen food waste and place it in the shared Positive Waste food waste recovery wheelie bin (located locally in Sydney), where it’s collected weekly and taken to a biodigester facility (pretty much like a big metal cow’s stomach) where it produces green energy and nutrient rich fertiliser. Membership costs $3.80 per week, you can cancel any time.
We hope these help create a more sustainable 2020 for all you beauties. We’ll be back soon! Email us if you like by responding directly to this email. Miss you!
S+S