Hello, hello!

For us, we are seven at home. Our communal living situation is the result of a distaste for overspending on rent. For some, high property prices and subsequently high rents are a positive but in reality, the more you're spending on rent, the less there is for everything else and everywhere else. That said, we understand the potency of creating a nurturing environment regardless of ownership—investing in ourselves, in one another and the space we all share.

So as temperatures cool, we find ourselves inside more—excited about exploring other forms of nourishment for the body [think soups, tonics, ferments] and our minds, with documentaries and an endless supply of nightstand reads. We revel in this window of time to cultivate magic within the walls. Do you guys feel this way? And if so, how do you create a nurturing home?

For long days when you want to keep your time in the kitchen brief, this salad provides grounding starches and fibre — essential for digestion, detoxification, regulating hormones and your microbiome. We’ve also included a list of high fibre foods to help you plan towards your 25 to 30 grams daily.

Time flies, and it’s been a couple of years that we discovered, and are using Aleph, the natural makeup brand made in New Zealand. Last year was an opportunity for founder Emma Peters and her team to launch new products and dive deeper toward a more sustainable beauty business. With vegan, cruelty-free makeup made with high quality AND multifunctional ingredients, it is exciting to see an increased offering with just what we need. We recently refreshed the brand profile for you to fall in love (again?) with Aleph.

As part of Fashion Revolution Week we attended ZERO% in partnership with NZ Viva, presented by Kowtow, where founder and creative director Gosia Piatek lead a panel discussion towards a plastic-free, zero waste and carbon positive future.⁠ As always, a big part of the sustainability issue comes back to consumption, current production and having to slow that down. We discuss the growth of circularity in the fashion industry and how to engage responsibly in the resale economy.⁠⁠

Wash, scrub and sanitise had been on repeat for most of 2020, still is for many and so this month we are sharing hand care essentials from yes, sanitisers and exfoliants to moisturisers and less toxic polish.

A couple of months ago, we met with Niva and Yotam Key, permaculture farmers living in Coromandel, New Zealand. Last year, they wrote "The Abundant Garden", their first book released late last month. They share all the techniques established while working on their small scale, regenerative, organic market garden, equally applicable to home gardening. Small scale farming is the future; this book will help you join the food revolution!

Returning to full-time work in Architecture this year brings exciting challenges, yet it reminded me how wasteful the Construction sector is. For example, in Auckland, 50% of the total waste going to landfill comes from the building industry. I went to an event organised by The Sustainable Network, "Building Out Waste 2021", about the initiatives actors across the sector in New Zealand are trialling or putting in place to reduce this plague. Few examples were shifting materials and products design by taking into account their after-life, and ditching skips bins to remove construction waste, separating leftover materials on-site to be reused and adequately recycled. Other actions included extending the lifetime of a building through modularity and repairability. Or, finally, to encourage prefabrication, relocation, deconstruction or reconstruction before demolition. Implementing policies that incentivise waste minimisation would start resolving waste issues. However, it also requires a change of behaviour within the industry.

Read this week. Brazil's Amazon forest has released more CO2 in the atmosphere than it has absorbed over the past ten years due to recurrent fires, degrading the forest and releasing greater carbon dioxide volume than what this ancient forest can absorb. According to this article from last year (why didn't I read that earlier?!), we can no longer rely on the largest tropical forest in the world as a carbon sink to fight climate change. From cattle ranching and industrial agriculture, feeding said livestock (also used in New Zealand), logging, mining and coca-growing, oil and gas development, greed and lack of long-term vision have consequences worldwide. The Amazon forest is a significant biodiversity-rich ecosystem influencing local and global climate while storing carbon dioxide.

So what can we do? Vote for those who engage to respect the planet, ask your political representation for engagement and accountability, learn and talk about the issues, drastically cut down your meat consumption, look for FSC certifications on products, and to a minor degree, go paperless. We can do it.

If you were to come to our place, you'd find incense burning all day long. The new favourite is from Ayu, fair trade and hand crafted in India using sustainable and naturally infused ingredients discovered via Penney + Bennett. Patchouli and Clary Sage are my latest additions, offering up a smokeless burn that lingers on and on.

Eleven Madison Park, the Manhattan restaurant that has been called the best in the world, will reopen June 10th with a fully plant-based menu — the result of considering pandemic learnings. In addition they changed their business model to continue supporting the food insecure in their community including a food truck operated in partnership with Rethink Food. While some question the validity, we remain hopeful others follow.

It’s not easy to find a deodorant that is hyper effective, better for you and the planet and looks good enough to keep out but I’ve heard good things about Kosas and have their Chemistry AHA Serum Deodorant on the way via Mecca.