Bus Brake Planters

Started by two Rhode Island sculptors who were overwhelmed by the amount of industrial waste, Industrial Evolution turns cast offs and leftovers into functional products. Their first contribution is their bus brake planter collection. "City bus brake drums are routinely replaced and discarded. We repurpose the cast-steel drums, creating these heavy-duty, indoor/outdoor planters." Available in four distinct "styles", you can order them directly from their website. On the market for over a year now, I'm quite curious to see what their next offering will be.

Yolo Colorhouse: Zero-VOC paints

With the weather still cold and spring right around the corner, we find ourselves dreaming often of new colors and ideas for home renovations.

Once upon a time, and still found at your neighborhood home improvement store, paint contained a lot of bad ingredients and was very toxic. Traditional paint off-gases with noxious smelling fumes. Then low-VOC paints sprung up, which are water-based and contain less of those dreaded volatile organic compunds. Now, in addition to low-VOC paints, some manufacturers even have VOC-free options.

We're currently enamored with Yolo Colorhouse, a Portland-based company that makes premium, environmentally-sensitive paint that contains zero (yes, ZERO!) VOC. Developed by a collaboration artists and scientists, Yolo's designer palette has a beautiful range of modern, nature-inspired colors.

Refab Gives Vintage Fabrics New Life

Choose your own limited edition talking point from Refab's range of cushions, Funky Chicken doorstops and Psychedelic Snake draught exluders. All their products are handmade in their London workshop. Refab is an environmentally conscious company and they like to share with you their retro inspired vision of sustainable style, function and fun. Alongside their classic vintage fabrics from the 50's, 60's and 70's, they use reclaimed, recycled organic and biodegradable materials wherever possible. Refab breathes new life into vintage fabrics to bring color and pattern back into your home.

Haute Surface - Modular Cork Tiles

We've written about modular surfaces before, but it was all about walls surfaces then. Continuing the innovation of mio's modular wallpaper tiles, Isaac and Jaime Salm have created Haute Surface, a set of interlocking cork tiles that piece together to protect table and furniture surfaces.

Reconstituted cork is a sustainable, heat-resistant natural cushion for hot pots and pans that could scorch countertops. Besides keeping the kids busy, we especially like Haute Surface's houndstooth modularity because it's versatile enough to re-assemble a basic trivet into larger table runners or placemats.

It's time to get rid of that ugly trivet in the kitchen now. You know the one.

Haute Surface tiles are $20, per a set of 12, at re:modern