Eco Chic: Are ‘Green Homes’ the Next Trend?

The current economic downturn is starting to hit some segments of the luxury real estate market. Park Avenue Co-Ops and Condos in New York City are down 20-25% from the summer of 2008, and some of the priciest suburbs across the country are suffering even more.

Even the House of Chanel in Paris recently laid off about 10% of its workforce, causing French haute couture designers to proclaim “the new modesty” as the latest luxury trend, and the French press to nearly have a nervous breakdown rushing to redefine taste as, well, more tasteful. Simpler.

In other words, if you’ve got it, don’t flaunt it.

At least not until the peasants can eat regularly too.

One area that shows promise is that of high end ecologically sustainable merchandise, including the rapidly growing ‘green home’ trade. Sites are popping up all over the internet lately that are devoted exclusively to listings of luxury ‘green homes’: ecologically impressive dwellings that boast all the latest in sustainable living and ‘eco chic’ aesthetic, without skimping on cushiness and bling.

This Eco Chic Green Home in New Age Mecca Sedona, Arizona is on the market for 2,990,000.

While you might not personally have spare couple of million to spend on an ecologically-correct mansion, the fact that this trend is taking off in a market where not a whole lot of other trends are going all that well bears watching. So often the first break through in a new technology comes in the form of luxury merchandise. Not too long ago, no sane American working person expected to own a home with marble kitchen counter tops and an ensuite master bedroom, but over the course of the past ten years such things have come to feel like necessities to people whose parents grew up near factories.

Similarly, not everyone can own a Tesla, but Prius sales have definitely gone mainstream in a big way, and now a whole host of startup auto manufacturers are scrambling to offer the first all-electric plug-in vehicle priced right for mass consumption. Fifteen years ago owning PC outside the office was a big deal and a bit of an indulgence. Now teenagers have cell phones more complex than those first personal computers ever were. And so it goes.

Eco chic is taking off not just in the twin fields of home design and building materials, but also in the related areas of home decor, furniture design, and aesthetics. Ephraim Faience in Wisconsin, a pottery and design company that takes its inspiration from the work of the Arts & Crafts movement of the early 20th century, has become a coveted ‘green home’ source of objects d’arte. (Its slogan: It’s more than pottery. It’s a lifestyle.)

Flooring made of recycled wine casks and reclaimed wood from pioneer homes has become the latest status symbol, as have doors, windows, tiles, and anything else that can be reclaimed from the Arts & Crafts renaissance in America, the last ‘eco chic’ movement that actually produced beautiful things. (Let’s not discuss the 1970s, OK? If you remenber the 1970s in America, you weren’t really there.)

Attach the word “bamboo” to anything today and its price goes up at least 30%. Linen and fine cotton are experiencing a rebirth as desirable fabrics, even though they must be ironed and washed with care.(Natural=Good. Polyester=Ick.) Furniture designers who produce one-of-a-kind pieces made from sustainable woods and cast-off materials for upwards of $10,000 per piece are in greater demand than seems rational or sane.

You can have you cake and eat it too. It just has to be carrot cake. Made with whole wheat flour. In a solar oven.

Worse things could happen to America.

Some of the design trends in these homes are truly inspired, such as an emphasis on blurring inside/outside distinctions by incorporating outside ‘rooms’ into the interior design of larger homes, and an emphasis on including living parts of the landscape like ancient trees and rocks right into the interiors. Scent and running water are used in creative ways, and the entire aesthetic is very soothing and often serenely beautiful.

Just browsing these homes is enough to help some people decompress. It’s like visiting a spa over the internet. Maybe a green home isn’t affordable for the average person…yet. But just dreaming about one can be oh-so-soothing.

Trends in American real estate can be hard to spot, but the market could do a lot worse than to see a revival of a green sensibility where once there were only three car garages and overdone kitchens. With budgets getting tighter and stress levels rising, this could be one trend that filters down to the population at large and stays around awhile.