Organic Cotton Bedding

Organic Portico Sheets & Hyatt Hotels and Resorts

We like soft sheets and organic treats. So, just in time for the holiday travel season, eco-friendly home fashions brand Portico Home + Spa is launching an extensive organic cotton bedding program (sheets, pillow cases, and shams… oh my!) at Hyatt Hotels and Resorts. Now available in premier suites at 14 Hyatt hotels nationwide as well as in Aruba, additional Grand Hyatt, Hyatt Regency, and Hyatt hotels plan to add this bedding line to their premier suites next year. Another nice deet: Hyatt already offers Portico amenities (shampoo, conditioner, and bath soap) in recycled PET packaging in more than 100 hotels nationally, making them available at the www.HyattAtHome.com website.

The launch of these linens in Hyatt hotels marks the first step of Portico’s hospitality industry initiative whereby the brand will partner with leading hotel and spa properties with progressive corporate sustainability missions. As part of the initiative, Portico will provide one-stop-shop sustainable solutions for properties wishing to authenticate their “green” initiatives. One part of Hyatt’s global sustainability program, Hyatt Earth, also includes making responsible purchasing decisions. The organic cotton used in the bedding collection has been certified to Global Organic Textile Standard (GOTS) which prohibits the use of toxic inputs during textile processing.

Props to Hyatt and Portico!

Thailand’s Golden Triangle: Spun Silk at The Four Seasons Tented Camp

In the jungles of Thailand’s lush Golden Triangle, there’s an up-and-coming house of haute couture, but no… it’s not Karl Lagerfeld’s new Southeast Asian textile studio.  It’s a handful of designers at the Four Seasons Tented Camp in Northern Thailand. Overseeing the making of silk from start to finish and then dying the raw threads and weaving them into vibrantly coloured shawls, it’s a silk-worm farm run by the talented wives of the Four Seasons pro elephant drivers!

It all started when the crafty wives of the drivers, or mahouts, decided to find a way to augment their families’ livelihood. And so, they started hatching delicate silk worm eggs on paper towels soaked in sugar water. It’s not what you’d call high-tech, but it works.  A week to 10 days later when the eggs hatch, the hungry newborn critters start munching on mulberry leaves — their favourite snack. After molting four times, they enclose themselves in a silk cocoon. That’s where the wives come in; boiling the worms so they can unravel the silk threads before dying them. It’s no simple task: each worm produces one silk thread from 1,000 to 3,000 feet long.

The intricate shawls that result from the wives’ handiwork are the perfect souvenir for Four Seasons guests who’ve spent their stay learning to train and ride the property’s elephants through verdant tropical paths. Proceeds from the shawls go to the mahouts’ families and the Golden Triangle Asian Elephant Foundation, which assists in the conservation and care of domestic elephants.

So far, the women have sold more than 100 of these stylish stoles. To purchase one of these beautiful stoles or to make a reservation and watch these women in action, check out:

http://www.fourseasons.com/goldentriangle/

A Flair Necessity: Organic Accessories

Necklaces of Cardamom and Lupine?

When we say travel light, this is exactly what we mean. Reclaimed natural elements incorporated into a beautifully designed set piece. Jenny Nelson first caught our attention when we saw her interesting work and learned a bit about her life… chock full of equally inspiring experiences. Raised on the coast of Maine, inland from the mystical sounding ‘Mount Desert Island’ (where she currently resides), Nelson was completely surrounded by wild gardens, colorful flowers, and just the sort of woods filled with creatures who sing and buzz.

This idyllic childhood was the perfect setting for outdoor adventures… hiking and kayaking all around her forests, islands and little trees. With a passionate love of nature and words, she went on to study at a prestigious Creative Writing program straight out of high school (because they have such things in those magical Northern lands). In the years that followed, she lived ‘beautifully and randomly, hauling her snowboard around the Alps, teaching skiing and snowboarding, working at small and incredibly fun bakeries, poetry cooperatives, organic farming…’ until she happened upon a very well known jeweler in Northeast Harbor who soon became her mentor. She’s been a full time bench jeweler for her for the past five years, as Nelson says, ‘learning from someone who is a master at what they do.’

Talk about your regular, run-of-the-mill, renaissance Jauntophile.

“Inspired by a childhood spent in gardens and antique shops…’ she beautifully writes, ‘Embarking on countless adventures in the outside world, full of seedlings resting in organic soil, freshly cut wood, and salty ocean wanderings,’ she carries those scented memories into her hand-crafted line.
The only impact her work leaves on the environment? Beauty and substance. Working only with organic materials, found objects, salvaged metals and conflict-free stones, adorning yourself – whether jaunting to the kitchen or the Kasbah – has never felt, or looked, so damn cool. What’s more? You won’t show up to the same party with the same necklace as someone else. She customizes her pieces and each one is unique.

Just like you.

Now buzz off and get some work done already.
Don’t worry, you can come back later.

Pieces range from $65-$325.

http://www.wylde.moonfruit.com
http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5451268

Tell her Jaunt Magazine sent you.

A Flair Necessity: Pangea Organics

Pangea. How many bars, restaurants, and companies have promised you the world by taking this great concept and making it a reality? It’s certainly an honorable name for such an ambitious ideal. Deriving from the Greek, the word literally means ‘Entire Earth’ and is based on the super-continent that existed during the Paleozoic and Mesozoic eras (that’s about 250 million years ago), long before the continents split apart and shifted to become the earth we now know.

And what do we know?

Egyptian Geranium with Adzuki Bean & Cranberry Scrub ($33) by Pangea Organics, that’s what. It may sound like something good enough to eat with a side of brown rice, but that’s exactly why we covet it. These exotic organic products are earth-friendly right down to their Zero Waste bio-degradable box with, get this… basil seeds planted right inside! Yes, you can wiggle your green thumb with pride by simply slipping off the label, soaking the box in water, and planting it into the ground!

So scrub your porcelain cheeks knowing full well that you’re also able to directly have a hand in creating some much-needed oxygen in the world. Now listen up. They might be charging a bit more than your run-of-the-mill grocery store brands, but they’re certainly much cheaper than Chanel or Creme de la Mer.

If that’s not all, they’re developing the Pangea Institute, a non-profit dedicated to researching and teaching all aspects of sustainable living and business practices. An education center and ‘incubator for earth ideas,’ under the leadership of Civil Engineer Jon Previtali, they’ve invited architects, designers, visionaries, artists, students and amateurs to design a mixed-use community plan that will house the Pangea Institute, the Pangea Organics manufacturing facility and community housing.

Talk about Entire Earth.

Pssst… we also heart their Pyrenees Lavender with Cardamom lip balm rich in vitamins, nutrients and a deliciously awesome scent. $13

http://www.pangeaorganics.com