OrganizingLA Blog

California Closets Announces Its First "Green Product"

California Closets has announced its very first "green product."  Could this be a fresh new trend for the storage and organization industry?

The San Rafael, CA-based upscale closet manufacturer recently announced the addition of Roseburg Forest Products' Skyblend particleboard to its product line.  Roseburg, based in Roseburg, Ore., is a privately held, integrated manufacturer of a diverse line of lumber, plywood, particleboard and engineered wood products, with lands and facilities in California and Oregon.  SkyBlend is a Scientific Certification Systems (SCS) certified, 100% pre-consumer recycled wood fiber particleboard that has no urea formaldehyde added during the manufacturing process.

Have an enviornmentally-sensitive organizing product you'd like to share?  Give us a shout using the comment section below.

Picture above courtesy of California Closets UK.

Related Posts:

• Organic Organizing with Baskets from Design Pubic
• 9 Hip Tips for an Eco-Friendly Relocation
• The American Home:  Full of Formaldyhyde

Formaldehyde - The Embalmed American Home?

Up until a few years ago, I had no idea formaldehyde was commonly used in residential home building.  My father, a retired master carpenter said as the world's population grows, so does its need for alternative products that are cheaper, stronger and easier to build with.  You'd think a product that kills mold and mildew short term would be a good thing, right?

Most people know that formaldehyde is embalming fluid. It also is used to preserve body parts by hospitals and pathologists.

In addition to its preservation properties, formaldehyde is found to be a powerful and inexpensive resin and bonding agent for glue. This is unfortunate, because industry now uses it extensively in the manufacture of all the artificial wood products used in building a modern American house.

Formaldehyde is a colorless, strong-smelling gas.  When present in the air at levels above 0.1 ppm (parts in a million parts of air), it can cause watery eyes, burning sensations in the eyes, nose and throat, nausea, coughing, chest tightness, wheezing, skin rashes, and allergic reactions. It also has been observed to cause cancer in scientific studies using laboratory animals and may cause cancer in humans.  Typical exposures to humans are much lower; thus any risk of causing cancer is believed to be small at the level at which humans are exposed.

On the OrganizingLA Blog, we've always tried to highlight products and services that are so-called "eco-friendly."  And we'll continue to do so as much as possible.

On the Net:

• Read more about formaldehyde with the Consumer Product Safety Commission
• A volunteer firefighter talks about hidden dangers inside your home

Martha Stewart 15 Year Anniversary - Footage from Event

We've been promising to give an update on Martha Stewart's 'Good Things' event held in Manhattan at the beginning of the month, and we're still working on that.  In the meantime, here's a nifty video montage of the event, courtesy of YouTube and the television show:

If you have a question about the ''Good Things' Event, please type it below and we'll include it in our upcoming summary!  The questions we've received so far are soooo professional.  Anyone have anything silly to ask?

Related Posts:

• 1st Look at the 'Good Things' Event
• Martha Stewart:  Building McMansions in Southern California?
• Martha's New Deal at Macy's

Organizing Emergency: A Readers Asks For A Few Tips to Clear The Clutter

"What are some quick and easy ways for people to clear out clutter around their desks, closets, cupboards, etc.?"  Signed, "Catt in Catalina"

Dear "Catt in Catalina,"

Good question, We remember we received this question in a July 2005 article for Frontiers Newsmagazine, a local Los Angeles publication.  Here are 5 Quick Tips from our interview:

Top Chef 2 - Starring OrganizingLA Client & Hollywood Restaurateur Betty Fraser

Ahhh, the things you accomplish when you're well-organized.

LA Restaurateur Betty Fraser just doesn't only co-own the California-comfort food hideaway Grub and the successful catering enterprise As You Like It Catering, but she's also an OrganizingLA client.  And beginning Wednesday, Betty (pictured above in red dress, and below) serves up her organized dishes to more than just Hollywood, when she stars in the new season of Bravo-TV's Top Chef 2.

Here's a sassy clip of Betty from the electronic press kit-- view it here.  There's some culinary competition ahead-- can't wait for the premiere tomorrow evening.

Congratulations, Betty!

Related Posts/Posts With Betty:

• Betty's Goldfish Centerpieces at the 2006 Los Angeles Organizing Awards Get Mentioned in LA Magazine (2/23/06)
• Detroit Home Owners Getting Super Bowl Bashes (1/6/06)
• Disneyland Architect Storybook Home on the Market in Hollywood (3/1/06)
• Organizing Wine Cellars, Do It Digitally (2/15/06)

Business Organizing Tip - How to Bring An Entire Wardrobe To Your Next Conference

So you commit to that boring corporate conference and now you dread figuring out what to wear, and how to wear it. Why does it seem a suitcase is never big enough coming or going?  Well, there are no organizing decisions needing to be made here, because the super-sized suitcase has arrived.  Three Cheers!

It may not fit in the overhead compartment or even roll down the aisle, but Guinness Book of World Records Officials have certified this trolley suitcase on display at the Chinese Export Commodities Fair in Guangzhou, as Earth's largest.  It may also signal the Earth's ugliest luggage color indeed.  Where was this when I went to Italy?

Readers-- what color would you call this?  Come on and comment... we promise to not snag your zipper.

Thanks to OrganizingLA Blog reader Scott and SFGate!

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