Aug 24, 2010

Eco-Choice Award Winners Announced at NYIGF

White Plains, NY – After a week of voting at the summer 2010 New York International Gift Fair® (NYIGF®), three products – from more than 250 eligible for judging – were selected by retailers to receive Eco Choice Awards in three categories: Most Innovative, Most Sensitive Use of Materials and Most Sellable.

Co-sponsored by NYIGF and GREENRetailer, the Eco Choice Awards are presented semi-annually at NYIGF to top “green” gift and home products showcased in NYIGF’s juried SustainAbility: design for a better world® display. Winners are decided by popular ballot, based on inventiveness, newness, aesthetics and functionality.

“The green design movement is ever-evolving, and many stylish, functional and environmentally-friendly products were introduced at the summer 2010 NYIGF,” said Christian Falkenberg, NYIGF manager and GLM vice president. “The Eco Choice winning products really resonated with the thousands of buyers who attended NYIGF.”

The winners of the summer 2010 Eco Choice Awards are:

Most Innovative: Emerson House by Brinca Dada
Working solar panels power the 23 LED lights throughout this dollhouse, designed by Tim Boyle. The house is manufactured of CARB-certified wood and acrylic. www.brincadada.com

Most Sensitive Use of Materials: On The Rocks by Sea Stones LLC
Using stone and wood, two of nature’s most fundamentally recyclable materials, designer Arra David created these drink chillers which keep beverages cool without diluting them. The stone “ice cubes” are the re-purposed cores generated from drilling holes to create stone napkin rings. The hardwood comes from FSC-certified suppliers. The wood composts and the stones may be returned to the beach. Sea Stones plants a rough quarry stone in the ocean for every smooth stone they collect, and replants ten times the number of trees used each year. The Sea Stones workshop is heated and cooled with a geothermal heat pump. The energy required for tooling comes from water, which is 100% re-circulated. www.sea-stones.com

Most Sellable: Kitchen Basics by Bambu
These kitchen implements, designed by Rachel Speth, are made entirely from renewable, certified organic bamboo with no added finishes or substances. The eco-friendly production follows the company’s emphasis on both the process and the end product. There is a close proximity between the source of material and the labor team, which sustainably harvests the bamboo and dries it in the sun. Bambu supports the Grameen Foundation, 3rd Millennium, NRDC, and Collective Responsibility. www.bambuhome.com

The fourth semi-annual Eco Choice Awards will be announced at the conclusion of the winter 2011 NYIGF, Saturday, January 29, through Thursday, February 3, 2011, at New York City’s Jacob K. Javits Convention Center and Passenger Ship Terminal Piers 92 & 94.

NYIGF is the nation’s premier gift, home and lifestyle marketplace, with 2,800 exhibiting companies featuring an extraordinary breadth and depth of design-driven home fashion products and complementary giftware, and some 35,000 attendees from all 50 states and more than 85 countries worldwide. For information and registration, visit www.nyigf.com.