DAILY DANNY

Sweater Chair Re-Do

Well, little did I know that putting my home on the market would cause a little fuss!    I was amazed at how many people checked out www.riverroadhouse.com when apartment therapy ran an item about it.   Although they call it a "mini Turkey Hill" and I'll basically leave my comment about that, well, to myself. 

And then the NY Post put it in the real estate gossip column, which I have to say was kinda cool.   Braden Keil usually writes about people buying multi-million dollar apartments in NYC or listing their $20 million dollar spread in the Hamptons in his column.   And here he is talking about my modest $400K home:

It's easy being green

Environmental lifestyle guru Danny Seo is selling his eco-friendly Bucks County, Pa., bungalow for not a lot of green.

The noted interior designer, who has his own radio and TV shows and has penned five books, is listing the cozy, restored two-bedroom home on a small hillside lot for $425,000.

The maintenance-free property is surrounded by Japanese maple trees, ferns and evergreens.

Inside the 1,000-square-foot 1920s cottage are an upstairs sleeping loft with views of the Delaware River, exposed ceiling beams and a stone fireplace. Seo's updates include a kitchen with energy-efficient appliances, central air conditioning, a marble bathroom and a renovated screened-in porch. There is also a separate outbuilding that could be used as an office or artist's studio.

If that wasn't enough, a copy of the DVD "Simple Steps to a Greener Home," which chronicles the renovation and restoration of the home, is included in the sale.

For more information, visit riverroadhouse.com.

But I digress.    All the interest has been great, but it's always brought up a lot of peculiar questions about my house, too.   

People like the dining room chairs.   They really like them.   Correction: they like my $5 scratch-and-dent Ikea chairs.    And I think I know why.

I reupholstered some floor model Ikea chairs I bought on super-clearance about a year ago with some cashmere and wool sweaters I picked up at Goodwill.   It was easy: just unscrew the seat cushion, wrap a sweater over the cushion, staple gun into place underneath, trim off excess, screw back on and voila!  Sweater chair.

People are asking what the chairs cost.   Or if I'll include it in the sale.   People!    Go to Ikea (or look in your basement for a chair), spend $5 in the scratch and dent and do it yourself!   It's the easiest project ever and the results are really great.

Showering Your Plants

A few months ago, I tested something called a Rechargeable Water Bag that I used for a houseplant.   Basically, you put the large bag in a bucket of water, it swells up, and it slowly waters your plants at their roots over 30 days.  Each time you rewater the plant, the bag recharges and you never have to really worry about your plants again.

So, I figured I would remember to water this guy at least once every month.    Wrong.   

Today, as I was waiting for the water to warm up in the shower, I noticed I could easily just plop the plant in the shower and let the cold water coming down water the plant and then swap it out once it gets warm.

If you have one of those shower/tub combos, you could easily fill up a watering can with cold water this way, too.  Once it's full, your water would be warm enough to shower...and you'll have a watering can full of clean water for all your thirsty plants.

Terra Cotta Candles

We recently did a photo shoot in Bucks County, PA at stylist Lynn Butler's home.    I spied these terra cotta candles in her kitchen and took a snapshot; she sells them on her website through her company The Product Gallery. 

I've just shot an email to my friend who makes candles through his website www.itsasoy.com.   You see, I have a whole collection of weathered and antiqued terra cotta pots sitting in my craft room.   But like most terra cotta pots, they have a drainage hole on the bottom (and I am guessing unlike the candles in this photo).

So what can I use on the bottom of the pots to make sure the melted wax doesn't pour right through when I make them?   Or is it enough to prop them on wax paper, pour the wax, let it cool and then peel them off the wax paper?   

I'm either going to make a terrible mess or be the luckiest crafter alive.    More to come...

Candy Tin Gift Boxes

Here's a sweet idea: candy tin gift boxes.

I put together this eco idea for Cosmogirl magazine, but the story got nixed and I was stuck with these images.  So I thought I'd share themw ith you.

Save all your metal candy mint tins and cover the top with a piece of woodgrain contact sheet paper.  You can find the contact sheet paper in most home improvement stores; just trace the top, cut, and peel off the backing and place on top.   This will conceal the words ALTOIDS on top of the box.

The boxes are just big enough to hold a gift card and the smaller tins can hold things like earrings, cash and other small gift items.

Put a whole stack together and tie with ribbon and give a week's worth of mini gifts.     When the recipient is done, they can toss the tin into the recycling bin since it's 100% recyclable tin.

Fall Eco Check List

I did a fun segment on the Saturday CBS Early Show over the weekend sharing tips on getting ready your house (and yard) ready for Fall.   

Who knew letting fallen leaves gather in the sewer system, which flushes into lakes and rivers, would be bad for the environment?    The leaves decompose in our waterways, become fuel for algae, and giant algae blooms come alive in the Spring.     Just running your lawnmower over the leaves on your yard so they become beneficial mulch is the simple and easy solution.

Watch the video online and learn how to transform a sock into a draft dodger and disinfect your bird feeders in one simple step.

http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/main500251.shtml?id=3288173n

Plastic Bag Rehab

I've been working away with Method cleaning products for a bit now.  We just wrapped a photo shoot where I recycled their entire packaging into fun and exciting craft projects.  You'll have to check them out at www.methodhome.com.

Another fun collaboration was this Plastic Bag Rehab reusable tote bag we created together.     Don't you love the design and color?

The bags are not for sale, but part of a holiday promotion we're doing where if you purchase $20 worth of Method products between now and the Christmas holiday, we'll send you this bag free (minus shipping and handling).   You can learn more at methodhome.com in a few days...

What I LOVE about this tote is that it folds up incredibly small, so you can stash it in your car's glove compartment or in your handbag or--in my case---briefcase.    And it's super strong and durable, so it holds really heavy groceries, too.

Tell me whatcha think. 

UPDATED:   The eco recycling projects I've done for Method are not up yet on methodhome.com.  I'll let you know when we post them up.     In the meantime, I'll post a sneak peek later this day at one of my favorite projects we've done.

River Road for Sale

After much thought and going back and forth in my mind, I've decided to list my Bucks County for sale on the market.

You can learn more about the house and see a photo tour at www.riverroadhouse.com.

I've done so much restoration and renovation to the house over the years, everything from turning an outbuilding into the ultimate crafting room, painting inside and outside the house, restoring the front porch and screening it in, doing a totally top-of-the-line green renovation in the kitchen, re-tiling the bathroom and so much more.

We shot part of my TV show "Simply Green with Danny Seo" right at this house and the best-of DVD is in stores now.    We did a Country Home magazine feature shoot her, shot the LIFE magazine holiday cover story here and even had the Bravo Crew from Live Earth film here. 

But as my work grows and the renovations are complete, I feel it's time to move on.   I actually like living in work zones and seeing homes come back to life.  So I'm on the hunt for a fixer upper farm in the Bucks County area to do my eco-magic on yet again.   

www.riverroadhouse.com   

Bird Houses in a Row...

Okay, if you read this blog a lot, you know I am constantly grabbing the digital camera and shooting ideas and "things" that I find interesting.    I literally have hundreds of photos on files of things I've shot that I've totally forgotten why I even shot it.   It could be a candlestick that I thought the finish was interesting, but when I look at the same photo 6 months later, I have no idea why I thought it was interesting.

But this photo speaks for itself: cardboard birdhouses in the windows of Anthropologie near Rockefeller Center.    Will a bird ever call any of these homes, well, home?    Probably not.   

But it's a great example of taking a cardboard shipping box you have around the house, cutting it up into squares and rectangles, painting it green (or whatever leftover paint you have) and then there you have it: bird house.

Funny how they lined them up on a branch as if they were birds....

Eco Times Square!

How cool is this?  I was in NYC for work and decided to get off the subway one station early and enjoy the crisp, beautiful day.

I got off at 50th street and the first thing I saw was a billboard for Method cleaning products at the Duane Reade store.   So I immediately and quickly looked for my digital camera and took a shot of it.

You see so many consumer products being advertised in Times Square, it's kinda cool to see something eco-friendly being advertised.   Method products are sold at Duane Reade in NYC now, so that may be why they are advertising them right outside the store.

Tomorrow, I'm going to see comedian Amy Sedaris explaining the art of hospitality.  I'll take lots of photos and will tell ya the funny stuff she says.

Wine Cork Mirror

I get ideas from everywhere.  Stores, a hotel lobby, a torn sweater in a donation bin at the thrift shop.  It's all over the place.   Inspiration, that is.

Here's a mirror I saw in a store recently with glued on wooden circles all over it.  I thought the texture and shapes were interesting, so I took a digital photo.

As I was looking at a pile of wine corks in my kitchen junk drawer the other day, I thought it would be cool to cover a whole mirror frame with wine and champagne corks.

So, I've been slowly yet surely saving them.    As you can see from the photo, you need A LOT of wine corks, so I've been going up to people in restaurants and asking them for their wine cork and begging bartenders to stash a few extra for me throughout the night.

I'm just about done scavenging for corks and I picked up a raw wood mirror from Ikea to test the project.  Results will be posted soon....

Falling Petals

I get ideas from the most random of places.   Case in point: a hotel in San Francisco.

As I was waiting for the elevator to arrive in the lobby, I looked around and saw this giant shadowbox artwork at the end of the hallway.     Here, simple silk rose petals are glued to a base board and displayed in a way as if they are falling down.

I thought this was a great idea for creating art at home.    Who doesn't have a bunch of ugly silk flowers in the basement of their home?   Pluck off the petals (leave the steam, fake looking leaves and other bits behind) and just scatter the petals all over the inside of a shadowbox.    Or collect autumnal leaves from the backyard and press them in between pages of a book.  Once dry and pressed, scattered them inside a box and---you guessed it---scattered them as if they are falling leaves.

I Like the Lichen Tree

I was away for a few days and came back to a fallen tree in the front yard of my house.  Not a big deal, just a little tree that had fallen down with almost no damage to the yard. 

The tall 10' base of the tree was covered in soft green lichen and some moss (perhaps the reason it fell down, right?), but I just loved all the natural colors all over it.   So I decided to keep it by propping it up against the house.

So, here it stands like natural art against the stone fireplace.  I'm thinking of just keeping it here, it just, well, belongs.     I love going into nature and finding little decorative accessories here and there: heart shaped rocks, autumn leaves in bright hues, sheets of natural moss, even birch twigs with the white outer layer peeling off....

Tree Free Paper

I'm on location this week working on a Country Home magazine photo shoot, so these posts are coming late.   In other words, I'm going through my archives and seeing what neat-o things I've missed I can share as I drink my well-deserved glass of wine after a very very long day.

Okay, how about this?    TerraSkin "paper."     It's a tree-free paper that's made entirely out of reclaimed mineral powder and resin; no water is used to make the paper and it feels like a smooth, luxurious paper perfect for booklets, labels and shopping bags.    The best part?  It breaks down back into natural mineral powder if you ever throw it out.    

A bit from the company on TerraSkin:

Terraskin® fits the bill as an environmentally friendly production material.  Comprised of 75 percent recycled mineral powder and 25 percent resin, unlike standard paper production, no water is required in the production of this paper.  The paper can be safely incinerated and recycled using exactly the same methods as matt laminated packaging. Meanwhile, waste paper breaks down under natural light over a period of approximately 9months, returning to its original powder state.

The Museum of Modern Art in New York City was one of the first end users to put Terraskin® into use.  Since 2006, MoMA has used Terraskin® for gift boxing and packaging in its stores.

Donate Away!

This goes under the file: Who knew?   This tip is from my new one-a-day calendar "Do Just One Thing."  You can find it on amazon.com if you want to pick one up....

No need to be too picky when donating clothes to charity.  Only about 10% of donated clothes ever end up for resale in thrift shops; the rest is sold to textile recyclers.   Ripped jeans, way-too-faded t-shirts and other worn-out clothes are recycled into cleaning cloths and other industrial items by these recyclers.   They pay charitable organizations like Goodwill and the Salvation Army a fee for the old clothes, which adds up to a significant amount of money for their charitable works.   So clear your closets clean and give away.

So when you donate that high school tie-dye shirt, super ripped jeans and really-shrunken polo shirt, don't stress.    You're still helping and doing your part.

LOVE Candles

I spent last week in San Francisco working on some craft projects for Method Home Products.    They'll be posted soon on methodhome.com, so keep checking.  I'll post something on this blog when they're up.

In the meantime, here's something that didn't quite make the cut: reglazed LOVE vases.

First, you start with some of Method's soy candle containers after you've enjoyed the yummy goodness inside.   

Then you wash them well under hot water; the hot tap water should be enough to melt the residual wax and give you a clean container to work with.

Once dry, stick on alphabet stickers (found at the craft store).  Above, I put L O V E on each vase, spelling...uh...LOVE.       Then you cover the whole container with a porcelain glaze (I get Pebeo brand from Michael's craft stores) in whatever color you like.  You may need a coat or two, depending how dense you want the glaze color.

Allow to dry for an hour.  Peel off sticker.

Bake in oven at 350 degrees for about 20 minutes, turn off oven, and let them sit and cool in the oven.

Use them as vases on the mantel place.... fill them with flowers and give them as a gift to someone you love.

Last Hurrah to Summer

The sun seems to be setting sooner.   There's a brisk chill in the air.    And you find yourself pulling out the extra blanket for the bedroom.    Sigh.   Summer is over...

But it's still warm enough to dine al fresco, so why not?    Here's a picture from my book Simply Green Parties; it's an outdoor set-up in the woods.   I remember the day we shot this photo; it was drizzly, cold and wet.   Everything was wet.     But the end result looks charming, doesn't it?

Grab that little used painter's tarp in the garage and stretch high up in the trees using rope.   Give the canvas some slack to make it look billowy and not taught and totally stretched out. 

Bring some indoor chairs outdoors and dress them up with pillows and blankets.   Poke some solar powered outdoor lights in the ground for accent lighting.   Grab a homemade pie or cake, some salad and sandwiches and bring a big bottle of wine.       Say goodbye to summer and hello to Fall!

Best of Country Home

As the Environmental Lifestyle editor at Country Home magazine, I get to share lots of DIY recycling projects in the pages of the magazine. If you're a subscriber or pick it up at the newsstand, you can check out my Fresh Thinking column every single month.

Over at countryhome.com, they've had a facelift and started posting my "best of" column on the web, so you can see previous project ideas and try them out yourself.   Click on the links below each image for the step-by-step instructions.  Here's a few:

Recycle an old cookbook into a functioning clock.

Make your own aromatherapy linen spray.

The EASIEST DIY homemade soap with sandy body scrub.

And what to do with old vintage-y t-shirts....make art!

One Color Glassware

Lately, lots of people seem to be displaying their collection of books not by title or genre, but by color.   It's striking: rows of white books followed by rows of black colored books followed by deep red jackets.    It's like instant literary art in a room.

The one-color grouping idea could work in other areas of the home.    Here, in New York City, I took this shot at what's called a "prop house."    Basically, people who produce photo shoots for magazines---like Country Home where I work----visit these giant stores that are stacked with everything and anything you need to create gorgeous photo shoots.     It's like Blockbuster video for stylists; you rent what you need for a week and return it when you're done.

I saw this rack of glassware and loved how they grouped them by color, not by type of glassware.   Wouldn't this look amazing in a home with open cabinets?   

And here's one more shot of some cakestands....just because:

Will Style Save Us?

I did an interview with StyleWillSaveUs recently and it's recently been posted up live.

I like this website to find out the latest in stylish green and gorgeous goodies for the home, for fashion, skin care and much more.     It's definitely worth bookmarking and checking out often for greatest and latest.

Anyway, this interview with StyleWillSaveUS focuses on my work with Country Home magazine, including a fun project involving simple ways to recycle old wineglasses and other chipped glassware into new warm and inviting candles. 

Here's a sneak peek:

Rocky Birds...

New York City is a great city to see lots of ideas, new products and really creative window displays.    On a walk to a business meeting in the West Village, I stopped and took a digital shot of these display.

It's just pieces of rocks with wooden (or porcelain?) birds resting on top.    I'm tempted to head to the craft store and buy an unfinished wooden bird, paint it a very vibrant solid color (like a deep orange, or maybe in chalkboard paint....then I can "draw" on the feathers and details with chalk...) and glue it onto a large river rock from the river in front of my house.

Do you ever get decorating ideas from window displays?

Matteo Home Organics

Going through my digital files today and I came across some scoutings shots of Matteo Home exhibiting at the NY International Gift Fair.    

If you live in New York City, you can see an extensive collection of their bedding at ABC Carpet and Home.     The line (and ABC Carpet & Home) are really must-see visits if you're ever in the Big Apple.

Anyway, what I love about Matteo is their simplistic and honest approach to bedding: good high-count textiles, simple and muted colors, understated by luxurious design.    You'll never see sequins or or loud stripes or trendy patterns.  It's all timeless in approach.

This year, Matteo is launching an organic line of bedding, towels and accessories (like bath robes).    But until then, here are some shots of their collection..

Some throws and blankets.    Has a vintage, historical feel to it...

And a muted floral pattern pillow that feels Shabby Chic, but a bit more masculine in it's approach.   I could see these used in a guest room or loaded up on the front porch in the summer.

Curly Magazine Ribbons

Hmm...I wish the photo was a bit clearer, but here's the idea: Tear out heavy stock advertisements from magazines and make them into colorful gift toppers.

It's easy!    Cut lots of 1" strips from the magazine page.    Gather them in your hand and place one strip on top of the other, moving each strip about 2" away from the next one until you eventually have a stack that is totally fanned out.    Staple them together in the center.   

Then using sharp scissors, curl each side of the strip, from the center out.    This can take a while and if you try to curl them too aggressively, the strips can tear, hence choosing the heavier paper stock advertisements.

Then take two extra strips and make the ribbon "strings" on the bottom.    Attach those to the back of the curly top with double stick tape.

Eco Labor Day

If you need some quick and easy ideas for your Labor Day backyard picnic, look no further.

Check out CBS The Early Show's recap of our recent Green Picnic segment.   

Learn how to roll out an eco-friendly recycled plastic rug, start a backyard grill with a DIY firestarter, keep sandwiches and chips stored in reusable containers, and even filter your own water on the go.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/08/31/earlyshow/contributors/dannyseo/main3224556.shtml

Recycled Milk Jug furniture

For as long as I can remember, one of the earliest eco-friendly, recycled pieces of furniture I've seen was recycled milk jug outdoor furniture.     LL Bean manufactures a line of side tables and Adirondack chairs made from the stuff.    It's eco-friendly because it takes milk jugs (and margarine tubs) and recycles it into durable "lumber."  That lumber is then cut and fabricated into furniture.      But since then, not much has been done to create updated and fresher designs with the material.  Well, that is until now...

When I was at the Southern CA Home & Garden show, I quickly fell in love with pieces from a Minneapolis based company called LOLL Designs.    They took the recycled milk jug lumber and made fresh, simple and colorful outdoor furniture.     When I spoke with the owner, he said the color never fades (A+!), doesn't chip and you could leave it outside in the winter--uncovered---and it'll be good as new in the Spring.

Aren't these chairs great?     And the white color is perfect for summertime use because it'll reflect the hot ray's of the sun instead of absorbing them.    And the clean, simple aesthetic can work in almost any decor.    I can easily see these on a front porch or a grouping of them around a big copper firepit outside.

This picnic set is what we showed on CBS The Early Show.    Here, it's pictured in black.    But I think the whole set would look better in their other color palettes:  a chocolate brown base with a deep red table top with matching deep red or brown stools.

Check out more at www.lolldesigns.com