A goat farm in idyllic Pescadero, Calif., is making inroads into the home decorating business. Besides goat milk and cheese, Harley Farms Goat Dairy also sells goat milk paint. Really.
Traditional paints you find at hardware stores contain a whole list of unpronounceable ingredients that can be incredibly toxic if they enter the ecosystem. Some canned paints have VOCs (Volatile Organic Compounds) and the fumes can be harmful. FarmPaint, however, is non-toxic, VOC-free and made from stuff you might find in your own home — goat milk, soap, flax seed oil, water, salt. It’s safe for baby nurseries and you can even eat it off the brush, if you like.
The paint comes in nine different colors and leaves a rustic, chalky finish that lasts for years. And because the paint is so farm fresh, it has to be used up in three months or else it will actually curdle. With this paint, you can save the environment until the goats come home.
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Tag: Design
This Teacher is Helping Young Girls Literally Build Their Way to a Better Future
Emily Pilloton needed to teach fundamental social and life skills to her students, so the teacher and designer did that the only way she knew how — through an innovative, hands-on shop class.
Now, the shop class has followed her from Bertie County, N.C., to Berkeley, Calif., where she founded Camp H, an after-school camp that teaches design and building skills to girls 9 to 12 years old. Why girls? Pilloton told Slate she noticed her male students were more willing to readily tackle problems while female students usually wanted a set of directions or steps before attempting the project. “There aren’t enough spaces for girls to be together as girls doing things that feel audacious,” Pilloton told Slate. “I don’t want girls to just be given a hammer and say ‘You’re holding a hammer, that’s awesome!’ I want to teach them how to weld. And to work on projects that don’t feel artsy and craftsy. Not like straight-up wood shop, but to balance the creative and the artistic side.”
Pilloton is now teaching an after-school class that will teach girls “to fix the things that need repair, installation, and maintenance in our everyday lives,” which will include checking the air pressure in tires, fun experiments and core math and science concepts — subjects that students often become bored with during Pilloton’s target age group. In the future, the program plans to have students build furniture and lighting for women’s shelters.
“I want the projects either to have a personal connection or to teach the girls about being a citizen,” Pilloton told Slate. “I will never ever just give a girl or a student a set of plans and tell her to follow instructions.”
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Can a Pair Of Blue Shoe Laces Kickstart American Manufacturing?
Most retailers seem to be in agreement that Americans don’t care about where their products come from as long as they get what they want. Thanks to The Blue Lace Project, retailers might be in for a rude awakening this season. In an effort to prove Americans care about domestically produced goods, New York-based clothing manufacturer Flint and Tinder partnered with Portsmouth Ohio-based Sole Choice to create “the very best shoelace they’d ever made.” The result is a blue double-waxed canvas shoelace strong enough to pull a 13,000 pound truck. Founder Jake Bronstein hopes both the product and the color blue will serve as a symbol to retailers and others that there is strong demand to restore American manufacturing. The project met its original $25,000 funding goal on Kickstarter just 10 hours after it became public, and went on to raise over $150,000 in just 30 days. It’s not too late to support the movement. You can still buy a pair of blue laces for $5 at Flint and Tinder.
Must See: Amazing Sculptures Out of Alaska
Some of our country’s most beautiful places are also most vulnerable to pollution and environmental damage. That’s why this art project in Alaska is so cool. Kachemak Bay community members are turning ocean trash into eye-catching sculptures. The idea is to raise awareness about better ocean stewardship by without turning people off. You won’t believe the amazing sculptures that local residents have created with the Marine Debris Art Workshop, like a supersized Lion’s Mane jellyfish. Could something like this work where you live?
Source: Earth 911