"Water: It's pure, it's healthy, it's perfect--and we've made it better. The future of water sounds distinctly unlike water."

Two semesters ago in my sophomore studio we were assigned a Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) project tracking a certain product from cradle to grave in conjunction with reading Cradle to Cradle. After our initial research stage wepresented the LCA to the class we then went back and redesigned the product to make it more sustainable. Most of the objects assigned were fairly complex, my group redesigned the TetraPak. others did the Fusion razer, Downy Wrinkle Remover among others. The project really got all of us in the sustainable design mindset, which is quickly becoming the norm among industrial designers.

I have been trying to catch up with my design blogs from the past few days and was suprised to find an excellent article on the LCA of bottled water on Core77.com. I have always been big on using my Brita filter and veering away from purchasing bottled water, but this article is sure to make anyone who hasn't made the switch think twice. Here are a few bits that I found interesting.

In Fiji, a state-of-the-art factory spins out more than a million bottles a day of the hippest bottled water on the U.S. market today, while more than half the people in Fiji do not have safe, reliable drinking water. Which means it is easier for the typical American in Beverly Hills or Baltimore to get a drink of safe, pure, refreshing Fiji water than it is for most people in Fiji.

And...

In San Francisco, the municipal water comes from inside Yosemite National Park. It's so good the EPA doesn't require San Francisco to filter it. If you bought and drank a bottle of Evian, you could refill that bottle once a day for 10 years, 5 months, and 21 days with San Francisco tap water before that water would cost $1.35. Put another way, if the water we use at home cost what even cheap bottled water costs, our monthly water bills would run $9,000.

To read the entire article go here.

For some reason I had high hopes about coming back to New Hampshire for a week. I wanted to go to the beach, pick some strawberries at the local farm, swim in the Saco river, and I had even planned a day trip to Concord, Mass to go to Louisa May Alcott's Orchard House, The Ralph Waldo Emerson House, visit Hawthorne's Wayside(which btw was originally bought from the Alcotts and later became the home of Margaret Sidney who wrote The Five Little Peppers and How the Grew), go to Walden Pond, and last but not least go to the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery and and find the graves of Alcott, Emerson, Hawthorne, Thoreau and others. Ok, so maybe that is a little more than a day trip. But instead I spent far too much time reading books from my mothers bookshelf such as A Guide to Writer's Homes in New England, which inspired the above plan which never happened. Instead I lugged 34 full trash bags full of clothes to the Salvation Army, drove a lot by myself, and Kristen and I tackled the attic Besides that I have been trying to figure out what is actually going on when I get to Denmark. Apparently I never received the pre-departure information back in April thus booking my plane tickets too early, and not realizing that I would be homeless for a day and a half. Thankfully I finally figured out the whole mess last night booked a bed in a hostel and got DIS to Fedex overnight all of the information that I mysteriously didn't receive. I still have to pack and hopefully the next time I write it will be much more exciting.

I got paid to hula hoop in dumbo today!

Aimee and I went to the Dumbo Family picnic today to promote Gymstars and the Circus camp! We brought out matts, hoops, ribbon flags and postcards. Not only was it fun, but I got free food too!

Dwell

I have been a fan Dwell for quite some time and they didn't disappoint me at their booth at their ICFF this year. I was especially drawn to the playful Dwellbaby textiles. My favorite being the Cowgirl and Cowboy sets.



After searching high and low for the perfect duvet mine finally arrived in the mail today. I was surprised in my hunt to stumble upon the Dwell for Anthropologie line and on sale too and instantly fell in love with the Silhouette bedding which I had seen on the Dwell site before, but this time in a mustardy yellow. Of course I had to have it even though it said that it wasn't available online. After some sleuthing I I tracked one down in a Connecticut store and had it shipped free of charge.




It looks a bit much in the above photo but I'm not planning on being so matchy matchy with my bedding, not to mention that I don't really have the budget for that. It's nice to splurge once in a while!

It is time to move on with my life. Yes, I have decided I needed a new blog. I have been a loyal livejournal user since the end of 2000. A lot has changed in those 7 years. I am no longer the awkward 14 year old about to enter high school, not to mention that horrid username. It is time for a change. I want to start fresh and new.

I am not sure what this blog will evolve into. I am hoping to blog about my creative endeavors, travel adventures, objects, writing, art or anything that inspires me, and whatever else I deem fit.