Keep Your Interiors Clean And Hygienic In An Eco-Friendly Way
When somebody hires an interior designer to help them create a home that they’re proud of, you can usually assume that they’re also the type of people who like to keep their new space looking its best.
This can take a number of different guises:
Decluttering before or during a renovation to get rid of anything that hasn’t been used or is no longer needed
Creating storage systems within the design to ensure that everything in your home has a specific place where it is kept
Regularly giving the place a good tidy and clean
But did you know that the products that you use to clean your home could potentially be damaging the very products you’ve just decided on and installed in your home? Well, neither did we to be honest until quite recently.
We crossed paths with Helen, one of the founders of Clean Living at the Interior Junction festival in Derby last September and have kept in touch since. We were really interested to learn more about their healthy cleaning products and that is how we began to learn about how the products we use to clean our homes affect the environment, but also the very fabric of our homes.
The use of eco-friendly cleaning solutions and refillable cleaning products has been something at the forefront of our own personal lives for a little while now. We have been buying all our household cleaning products from a local shop called The Refilling Station who focus on low waste, refillable products, avoiding single use plastic.
To be honest, this was mainly driven by our understanding that we need to use less plastic and avoid unnecessary waste. The brands that are available in a refillable format tend to be more eco-friendly and organic in terms of their ingredients, so we just assumed that not only were we doing something good from a packaging perspective, we were also ensuring that the products inside the packaging were also better for the environment.
However, what we didn’t realise was the impact that the standard ingredients in cleaning products have on the environment i.e. what enters the water system and affects marine life, but also the effect they have on our homes and the people who live in them. In many ways it’s not a huge surprise given the toxic hazard signs on so many of the cleaning products we use. But what’s great is that there is an alternative to those products now.
We are passionate about living a more sustainable life and doing less harm to the planet, both on a personal level as well as how we plan renovations and design interiors for our clients. Our clients are also talking to us more and more about wanting to update their home in a more sustainable way; as well as not wanting to redo it again, they want something that lasts.
So, when Helen kindly offered us the opportunity to try out some of her Clean Living products earlier this year, we were delighted. This gave us the opportunity to see how they work as well as whether we would recommend them to our clients.
We were sent the Bathroom Cleaner, and Kitchen Cleaner and Degreaser and Glass Cleaner. They come as empty refillable aluminium bottles which are far nicer to look at than your average bottles of household cleaner; so much so you could even keep them out on show rather than having to hide them away in the cupboard under the sink! Each bottle comes with its own reusable Glass Microfiber Cloth which is the same colour as the label on the bottle, meaning you know which cloth should be used for which part of your home; great for those of you who are control freaks like me!
You then empty the sachets of concentrate into the bottles, fill up with tap water and give them a shake. You’re then good to go. Being refillable cleaning products, when they start running out you buy new sachets and refill the bottles with the cleaning product and water again.
Having tried all the products a number of times now, we’ve been really impressed. The glass cleaner has, in fact, been quite a revelation in our house. We’ve never been very good at cleaning glass, or have never found the right product before. This product is game-changing, it cleans the dirt away but doesn’t leave streak marks - it’s incredible!
We were worried that the kitchen cleaner may not be able to cope with the greasier parts of the kitchen like the hob and oven, but it’s definitely on a par with many of the harsher products available. It also smells far nicer, less chemical. And given the live bacteria that’s included in the product it’s continuing to work even after we’ve stopped scrubbing. What’s not to love?
We will definitely be recommending these products to our clients moving forward. Sustainability isn’t something we try and ram down our clients’ throats. But given that these products do less harm to the very surfaces that we’re recommending that our clients buy and install, as well as being better for the environment, then why wouldn’t we?
And while we are still living in the shadow of Covid-19 and the coronavirus, it also makes logical sense to be keeping our homes as hygienic as possible, which Clean Living products do. So, not only can we help create beautiful homes for our clients, we can help them to maintain their beauty and support them in having healthy homes.
For more information about the Clean Living brand and its ethos, you can check out their homepage here. And to shop their wide range of healthy cleaning products, here’s a link to their shop https://cleanlivingint.com/products-for-a-healthy-home/.
If you are thinking about renovating your home and need some help or interior design inspiration, do get in touch with us here. And don't forget to follow us via Instagram, Facebook and our upcoming blogs.
Fresh Start Living is based in Leeds, West Yorkshire and covers the surrounding areas as well as offering a remote interior design service.