If you remodel or choose to make changes to your kitchen, keep in mind green decorating suggestions. Kitchen paint, wallpaper, flooring, and cabinets are all available as green products that are kind to your home and the environment. Check back in that chapter for a list of product brands and recommendations.
In addition, the following green ideas for kitchen design are suggested by Berkeley, California, architect Andrea Traber:1
- Locate work surfaces near operable windows or install operable skylights or suntubes for improved lighting and ventilation.
- For additional lighting, use high-efficiency compact fluorescent light fixtures, with a color-rendering index of 84 or greater and a color temperature of 3,500 Kelvin or greater, and with a quick-start electronic ballast.
- Avoid standard particle board cabinets and use formaldehyde-free medium-density fiberboard, plywood, or wheatboard for cabinet boxes.
- Consider bamboo, reclaimed or sustainably harvested wood, and wheatboard for cabinet doors and drawers; seal with a no- or low-VOC clear finish. (There’s further discussion of these building materials in Chapter Three.)
- For countertops, consider salvaged stone slabs or tile, and other unique salvaged materials. One green home used recycled wood from a bowling lane—solid one-and-a-half-inch maple—for countertops.
- Many environmentally responsible options exist for flooring, including stained and sealed concrete floors, sustainably harvested or reclaimed wood, bamboo, tile made from recycled materials, and even cork if well sealed.
The kitchen offers us so many opportunities to create a green world for our children. Make the switch to green foods, beverages, water, plastics, appliances, cleansers, and decor, one step at a time, in this hub of the home.
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