No matter how much the wind huffs and puffs through the hills above Byron Bay, the home of Rachel Bending, founder and creative director of leading sustainable fashion and homewares label Bird Textiles, and her partner Campbell is one house that certainly won’t blow down – despite the fact that it’s made of straw.

As someone who’s passionate about environmental responsibility, Rachel knew straw bale would be the perfect choice for the home she planned to create in the lush Byron Bay hinterland. A traditional building material with serious eco cred – it’s a renewable natural resource with exceptional thermal insulating properties – straw bale is undergoing a renaissance in dwellings. “It’s durable and, when you combine it with passive solar principles and an awareness of the site’s environmental considerations, you can design a house with significantly fewer energy requirements,” says Rachel.

Read more from this interview with Home Beautiful Magazine May 2010.....

The Salone del Mobile is the International Furniture Fair of Milan, the largest decoration tradefair in the world. The annual show showcases the latest in furniture and design from international sources. It is considered by interior designers as a leading exposition for the display of new products by furniture manufacturers, designers , lighting concepts, and other design items.

During the fair, Milan becomes a showcase for all things design, so along with the Salone del Mobile official events, a programme ‘Fuori Salone’ (‘outside the showroom’) runs in parallel, and it seems that these satellite design events  around the city are almost more exciting than the fair itself. 

Recent debate within the design community would suggest that sustainability is, or should now be, a fundamental consideration for all designers. Certainly, there is substantial evidence to show how design is making a positive difference in the troubled world in which we live. However, the design industry also continues to contribute to unsustainable systems of waste and excess and has played a significant role in many of the problems we now face. This is both a confronting and exciting time for designers as they make decisions about the work they do, the way they do it and the impact it has on our lives and our planet.

Object Gallery invited creative directors from five outstanding design studios – each based in New South Wales and each with a genuine track record in the area of ethical and sustainable design – to respond to this statement.

Bird Textiles was one of them.

How did we respond?

Eco artist Edina Tokodi is making her mark in one of Brooklyns’ trendy suburbs. With an emphasis on the touchy feely, her moss installations challenge preconceived notions of art and graffiti.

The mossy graffiti art offers an opportunity for interaction with nature within the city boundaries, and the artist believes strongly that the reaction (or lack thereof) of passersby speaks volumes. In an article in Inhabitat Edina says, ‘City dwellers often have no relationship with animals or greenery. As a public artist I feel a sense of duty to draw attention to deficiencies in our everyday life.’