Shag is back, baby.  And I do believe it is here to stay.

One of the perks of working with JCPenney as their Green Living Partner is that I get a sneak peek at all the new merchandise coming out before it hits stores.   I also style and produce our Simply Green look books, which go to magazine editors to preview so they can showcase the products in their magazines.

This last season, I decided to shoot the look book at my new house in Pennsylvania, which I had restored for the past year and thought would be the perfect backdrop for the products.   The process to produce a lookbook is pretty simple: the design teams at JCPenney send me boxes of product, we use it to style rooms, photograph it, and I send it back.   Unfortunately, mistakes happen and one of these Simply Green Shag Rectangular Rugs by Studio, didn’t make it back.    But fortunately for me, the good folks in our Home Office at JCPenney said it was fine to keep it.

And keep it I did and I love it.   

• First, the eco-attributes: each 5×8 rug keeps 200 plastic bottles out of landfills.    Old plastic water bottles are collected from recycling, shredded and respun into nylon fiber and made into these rugs.      They’re durable, cozy, soft and easy to keep clean.

• The color palette is neutral enough to work in any décor: chocolate, cream mist, mocha, red spice, stone and tarragon.   (Chocolate is what I have and I am literally resting my bare feet on it as I type this).

I think it’s important to buy recycled products made out of plastic bottles as much as possible.  Even though many of us are cutting back on our bottled water use, billions of bottles are still manufactured and just a small percentage is actually recycled.   Keeping those bottles out of landfills by recycling them into beautiful rugs like these is one way we can make a difference.   Correction: a cozy difference.

Fortunately for one lucky reader, you don’t have to style a lookbook for JCPenney in the hopes of scoring one: just leave a comment saying which room you’d put this rug in and why it would look eco-fabulous!      I’ll pick one lucky reader to win a 5X8 rug in the color of their choice. 

CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED.  CONGRATS TO “TAMARA” FOR WINNING.  We used a random number generator to choose the winner. 

Good luck!

-Danny Seo

I think anytime you have a chance to buy recycled products, do it.   If you’re like me, you put out your empty glass jars and bottles, aluminum and tin cans, recyclable plastics and newspaper out for recycling.    But do you ever wonder where it goes?  Well, recycling is just the first step in a 3-step process.   The next step is to find companies willing to buy the recyclable trash and turn it into a new, recycled product.   Then, the final step is that we—the consumer—buy recycled products to help the process going.

There are many everyday recycled items you may be buying that are recycled.  There are countless recycled paper products out there, ranging from copy paper to toilet paper to even your Starbucks coffee cup.    And JCPenney sells lots of recycled PET plastic products (plastic water bottles) that are made into cushy bed pillows, throw rugs and even fleece jackets.   

But when I saw these Recycled Glass Decorative Rod Sets by Studio coming out, I had to stop and stare.   They are just a lovely product that could work in just about any home and blue-greenish recycled glass finials are just ethereally beautiful.

I think we need to share the recycled love by giving a set of these recycled glass rods away.  The winner will have a choice of 28-48”, 48-86” or 86-120” pair of curtain rods.  To win, all you have to do is leave a comment saying which room you’d use these in and anything else you feel like adding.  I’ll pick one lucky reader to win.  Good luck!   Winner will be announced Friday, June 26th.

-Danny Seo

UPDATE: Congrats to LENA for winning. We used a random number generator to choose the winner.  Lena says: We are in the process of redoing my daughter’s room and this might be the nice finishing touch. Very cute!