Lush Hair

The first time I ever died my hair was with henna, and quite along time ago. Instinctively I have always avoided artificial chemicals and products full of them - specifically make up and hair products, and I have experimented with various natural materials and methods.

My favourite is the clay facial mask, bath and of course henna.

Here is one of my favourite brands - Lush - their henna is called poo but it contains a bunch of natural, lovely and safe ingredients -100%.

They make your hair look shiny, feel healthy with absolutely no risk at all.

Here are some more about it:
LUSH Henna Hair Coloring Products

What Is Henna?
Henna or ‘Lawsonia inermis’ is a privet type bush that grows abundantly throughout the eastern countries. It has a natural, vibrant red color that also coats hair to add loads of shine.

Henna quality depends on which country it is grown in. For instance, Egyptian and Pakistan henna gives a weak orange. Lush uses the finest henna in the world, which is grown in Iran (Persia) and gives a vibrant red color. Obtaining Iranian henna is not simple, but we are lucky enough to have a supply line into the UK. We purchase it by the container load (a few tons at a time) to offer the finest possible henna to our customers.

History
Hennas have been used since 3400 BC and is are well documented safe methods for dying hair (and skin). Hennas offer a safe alternative to coloring with commercial hair dyes. A henna can be modified with other ingredients like chamomile, rhubarb, coffee, and indigo.

OUCH: Originally, common commercial hair dyes were a product of the carpet dying industry in France. Such dyes were fatal substances and resulted in the deaths of many people.

Click here to go the Lush website and read more.

And that reminds me of a very important issue... The Codex Alimentarius.

Our top client hair and beauty salon Gielly Green is famous for their... sofas

We've been working with Gielly Green right from the start and it has been an great pleasure to look after this amazing space.

I couldn't resist blogging about their beautiful interior design, which the owners Fred Gielly and Shai Greenberg have designed themsleves.

Here is an exract from one of the articles on their designs from the ESMagazine:

Dentists use them, but every household should own one (it turns from an armchair into a bed/massage table in seconds).

I had the great pleasure to have sat on one, while I had the best ever hairwash/massage. Heavenly! ...and highly recommended - www.giellygreen.co.uk; t:02070243060...


The salon opened in Ocotber 2008 and it is a spa, beauty and hair paradise right in the heart of London.



Fred Gielly and the Reception area Shai Greenberg and him designed themselves.

My Carbon Karma

At the one life live show in March (where just a year ago I met lovely Katie Keegan, with whom we cofounded Green sisters) I spoke with the psychologies's editor in chief - Maureen Rice. She advised that I get in touch with Catherine Jones, who runs Psychologies' eco blog - Carbon Karma.

So in the last Carbon Karma blog post you can read about an eco warrior, who happens to be me... and I am very proud:

=

Let's hope this will be just a beginning of a successful and effective media journey!

Best Kate
Eco warrior and cleaning specialist!

Ultimately Spring time

Spring Greetings to everyone,

As Jonathan Ross announced last Friday - we have the hottest ever April - I must agree with him, it is too early to start sweating. No wonder some pretty deadly stuff is flying in the air. It is a scientific fact that flu viruses become more active, or was it the sci fact that people are more predisposed to viruses in Spring, due to our ehausted (from the winter) immune system and the sudden change of weahter conditions that are typical for the Spring season.

Swine flu is pretty serious, so as much as I have been promoting non-antibacterial products I must say - don't listen to me!

However I did my little research and I found those lovely eco and human friendly anti-bacterial soaps:
with tea tree:

Tea tree and calendula soap is similar to Lavender soap except that Tea tree is a more powerful antiseptic, anti fungal, and anti bacterial, and hence is a good soap to take travelling. Suitable for all skin types.

This 100% natural soap is made by Simply Soaps in the wild woods in Norfolk. All products are 100% Vegetarian, and most are Vegan too.(From Nigel's eco store)

Liquid tea tree soap:

This lemon tea tree soap is perfect to use in the kitchen and bathroom to reduce the spread of germs. Aloe vera and sugar beet make it gentle on the hands.
(From Eco Monkey)

Also please check out my website - I have managed to update few of the pages:
1. About Us
2. Our UECO shop
I have added some new brands: Natural Home, ENJO... Have a look! Anything that you fancy?

Enjoy the warmest April and please please, be clean and healthy - wash your hands!

Ecover answers questions in the Guardian

I have been using ecover for as long as I have known the brand.
May be nearly 4 years now. Ecover gives me security that it is biodegradable and will not harm my health and will not damage the environment, while it is doing what it is made to do - clean.
But since this big scandal with the water fleas, and I continue to hear some concerns about the eco credentials of a massive company that it seems ecover has become.
I have lived long enough to know not only about green wash, but about health wash, safe wash, honest wash and efficiency wash and since the trend to slash ecover continues I wonder how long my trust in Ecover will last!?

My favourite is the Lime scale remover. It does what is say on the tin and has saved me some good amount of elbow greese.


I am still investigating the quality of BioD and Method:
The one thing that turns me into an absolutely cleaning softy - if there is such thing is the design of the Method bottles... so funky!



What I put special attention on with my team is to make sure they have the know-how of how to use every brand and how to clean any surface regardless of the materials.
Ecover answers readers questions in the Guardian

By a Futerra Intern (and Doug Stewart):
Optimism isn’t just a belief that things can get better without knowing how. True optimists are the people who are actually searching for and creating solutions. Unless you have thought about and tried absolutely everything, it is very hard to prove that a better future doesn’t exist. So the main reason to be optimistic, then, is quite simple. If you really take it to heart it improves your odds of being right.

Since we started Green Sisters, or even as I was plotting my Ultimately Eco cleaning agency, I have been thinking about wrong and right solution to climate change - is there such thing as right or wrong answer to a global crisis. this idea flashes back a memory of when my little cousin(age 1, I must have been 21) got his first febrile fit. He had high fever and his mother had noticed some convulsions, we were just beginning to read what to do if he gets a fit, we haven't even read the first 2 sentences and he got it, his body twisted in the typical bow position, he turned pale and was convulsing. I took him and did what I knew, put my fingers in his mouth and pressed his tongue, I even slaped his face. It was so scary, and I did all the worng things, because I didn't have 30 more seconds to finish the home doctor instructions...

There are 2 points I want to make:
1. we should get educated, what is happening with the cliamte right now, what's the worse polluter, the worst contributor. I hope that when knowledge causes a reaction, that the first step is to know...then the solution or the desire to resolve will come naturally.
2. eventhough I didn't know what to do, I attempted to deal with the situation, the best way I could possibly do in this particular moment.
So to finish at an optimistic note:
My cousin is a lovely happy 11 year old. He is healthy and doing well. I took him skiing for a weekend. It was nice, he got better at the pizza/frenchfries and he came down some owesome slopes, covered in gorgeous thick white powder and I think we have a champion here!

Here he is at first 2008/09 school day, with his mother Elena Ilieva, Dramaturge of the Blagoevgrad Drama Theater.

Guardian Environment Blog .... Mechka Blog

Just added some text to my guardian profile: Bulgarian, but feel more inclined to say that I am born on this planet as the rest of us and am very considered about earth's future. Most of my life I have been searching for the meaning of life, who am I and have pondered many sleepless nights on what makes us happy. Now this seems almost irrelevant. We are talking basic Maslow hierarchy of needs here - climate change means not necessarily death but pain, suffering, injustice, loss, hopelessness, slavery and torture, it means, hunger, chaos and devastation - all the opposites of the purpose of our existence, what we have been striving for.
Last year I finaly managed to secure several bigger cleaning contracts using an eco friendly cleaning concept, trained several people how to use eco cleaning products and I was off on the road of green entrepreneurship. That's my bit. If you need a cleaner for your home or your office, or you simply need an advice about eco cleaning - just get in touch: kate@ultimatelyeco.com

Why is it so difficult to show some bravity to communicate my thoughts with the world.

I have been on a very focused journey dating from about the time I started reading books. Something switched, a little mechanism. May be one of the most influential books has been the Celestine Prophecy... or may be there was something earlier. Now, that got me thinking...
Where did it all start ... may be because I had a normal upbringing?
or may be it was this one sci-fi short story that my aunty read to me whan I was 10
or may be it all started while star-gazing lying in the grazing land near my grandparents microfarm in selo Mechka.

My mum just skyped me. She will send some recent pictures of that little microfarm where it all started...

Hadn't I had this experience, so close to the land, the earth, the plants, animals, wilderness or cultivated land. Wood chopping, constructing huts, I haven't allowed myself to think about this palce for a very long time. My family sold it in 1995 as we couldn't cope with maintaining it. We "invested" the money in tv set and some other household necessities, like a fridge freezer!
Sad.

Here how it looks today. Of course you can imagine that it has changed a lot.

The part on the right hand side, didn't existed. There was an outdoor tab with a large basin. The Bit on the leftb my grandfather had made it into warehouse, but it is now only a roof. There was a separate yard for the free range chickens and there were some apple trees, asma, a cherry tree, a 3 or 4 massive walnut trees.

I had a hiding or rather a reading place in one of the cherry trees. It was right in the centre of the plot high in the brunches of the tree. I spent quite a lot of lazy afternoons reading hidden in the brances of the tree. We had chickens, rubbits, goats and sheep, a dog and several cats.

All of us had to help in the farm and with the household, there was no escape. I have miles of hand digged and hand picked corn on my books! I did it, I moaned at the time but it always felt good at the end of the day.