(Ecology) Good Refillers

We love our crew of refillers. While this isn't all of you (yet), we hope to increase refill rates drastically by 2012. Green your daily operations, come with your containers!

(Travel) Weaver Conversion Underway

We're working with another weaver to move her from Chinese polythreads to 100% cotton.

(Travel) Banana Leaf Sachets

Sachets are a cool concept, except for the biodegradability component. They're democratic, but not as democratic as something you can make yourself. While we have been known to carry around jars of the sweeteners that suit our moods, on short trips, sachets are in order.

Find a banana tree in your village or neighborhood. They are a good thing to keep on hand for emergencies, and also to use when ironing your clothes. This leaf is from our garden. Remember, you need to "prime" the leaves by wiping clean and then heating over fire, creating a flexible sheet that won't tear.































































Fold into a triangle. Make sure that you fold it in such a way that there is no small hole in the bottom. Fill with your condiment of choice. Fold the top over and staple. I'm sure there are more elegant ways, but none as fast as stapling. Click here to see the finished products before we took them to Davao.

Remember that banana leaves seal moisture in, so the sugar will get moist, but will dissolve just as well if your coffee is hot. For drier products like fine salt or peppers, paper will do.

(Travel) Travel Essentials

We are on the road quite often, and we have travel essentials: Light canvas bags for interesting finds (these are from friends Clara and Chiara), tooth powder (Indian spicy stuff,  no airport fluid constraints), safety pins (you never know), a face towel, enzymes for  naturally disinfecting any dodgy surface, massage oil for relaxing on a balcony.


























A pocket-sized organizer, a notebook for thoughts, a nice book (of beautiful photos that you can look at over and over).












2 tiffins for food storage (takeout), homemade mascobado banana leaf "sachets" for our coffee, and utensils.

(Ecology) Hats and Snacking

No need to pass on the street vendors. If you have a hat or a hankie (or a tiffin of sorts), ask them to dump that takal in it.

(New) The Beauty of Everyday Objects

In a pre-plastic and pre-carbon economy, tropical people were in a constant rhythm of replacement. Things like old bamboo cups and natural roofing became nourishment for soil after their useful life. The nipa hut sheds, through its inhabitants, and grows a new head of hair. The kawayanan or sasahan was a sort of commons-- people looked after the bamboo and nipa groves because their regeneration was essential to everyday life. It creates a relationship of management, beyond just extraction.
These days, in the thick of the slick, we forget that many objects were designed by everyday people as simple responses to practical problems. We've seen people flatten out cans and pound holes in them to make graters. We've seen people carve knife handles to replace broken ones. The solutions are limited by the available materials, and the mind.


At the shop, we try to strike a balance between durable goods, and those that are not exactly meant to last forever, but come from quickly renewable resources and employ human energy to create. Unlike extracting plastic, maintaining our natural store of materials builds the soil, creates oxygen, water catchment, and habitat for ourselves and animals. When a natural item's useful life is over, just compost it. If you can't make a replacement yourself, buying a handmade one supports a craftsman and keeps the skill alive.

Pictured above-- handmade melon and coconut grater with a bamboo handle (the aluminum is inserted into incisions in the bamboo), hand-turned santol wood reflexology sticks.

(Ecology) Why We Don't Use Plastic Bottles-- Not Even Recyclable Ones

We package our formulations in glass because it is better for you and the environment. Why not plastic bottles, you ask, as most companies do (as in, the photo below)?



Get In My Belly (or Skin)

Even your typical "safe" plastic PET bottles can leach toxic antimony and endocrine-disrupting phthalates in normal conditions (or in prolonged storage or heat exposure). Moreover, many food and body products have ingredients (our would be essential oils, organic alcohol, etc.) that can cause mild corrosion when left pure on surfaces-- think about what they do to the bottle!

Plastic And The Planet: Manufacturing and Recycling

We don't think it makes sense environmentally either. You can never entirely recycle a plastic bottle, you downcycle it (you need to add new virgin plastic). Why is that bad? Because plastic comes from petroleum-- a non-renewable resource (plus extracting it from the earth is polluting and carbon-intensive, and its production and transportation is as well). Using a plastic bottle until your shampoo runs out, throwing it out for recycling, and subjecting it to another round of production really makes no sense! Glass is so much better-- a thorough cleaning, sterilization, and a new cap is much lighter on the environment if your supply chain is local (though we are looking for non-plastic caps, it's difficult!).

Recycling rates are much lower than you think, and when they do get recycled, THIS is what happens (though the video is from China, I'm sure you see junk shops around the metro-- not so different!).

Plastic And The Planet: Pollution

I dont' think I even need to go through the effect of plastic bottles and their relatives on the environment. Remember Ondoy? Remember swimming at the beach and getting a Hany wrapper in your eye? Yes, plastics do not disappear. They may be hauled to a dump out of your sight, but every bit of plastic you have encountered still does exist-- if they don't, they have been burnt, giving way to cancerous dioxins and other noxious gases.