Green is the new Black

I attended a seminar the other day at the Seattle Design Center by Bob Margulis of Ravenworks Joinery. For those looking for truly green, truly beautiful cabinetry, I highly recommend making an appointment with Bob!

Sustainably built kitchen cabinets by Ravenworks Joinery.

The seminar was designed to educate interior designers on "green building" and how they can educate clients and sway them towards "green" choices. What struck me was a comment Bob made about working for some of the wealthier clients in the Puget Sound area. When asked if it would violate his "green" principles to work for a client with a 10,000 square foot home, he said no, that he'd certainly take the job. Is he looking to cash in on a big project? While I am sure that the paycheck is nice, he had a more important reason for this choice. If he didn't take on the work, someone else surely would, and who's to say that that contractor would be using sustainable practices in his or her work? Regardless of Bob's (or my) opinion of living in that large of a home, making the cabinetry in such a home out of FSC wood is a great big checkmark on the side of the environment! It also gives Bob a chance to educate the customer or his contractors on other green choices that could be made in that home.

Bob made one other (I think) fantastic point. As environmentalists we *must* be careful about getting too high and mighty about our green choices. As he points out, what's "green" today may be "black" tomorrow. Take bamboo, for example. Just a few years ago this was touted as a fabulously green option for cabinetry, flooring, and other uses. Since then we have recognized that while it does *grow* sustainably, it is engineered using glues that off gas toxic fumes and it is also shipped halfway around the world, requiring enormous amounts of carbon based fuel to export. There is very little black and white in "green" - maybe green is the new gray.