Danny Seo - Simply Green Giving: Create Beautiful and Organic Wrappings, Tags, and Gifts from Everyday Materials

At the Environmental Media Association, we believe one way to actually change the world is shopping!

Everywhere you look, from the news to magazines and even TV sitcoms, there are references to living the green life as being good, cool, and responsible. It is typical these days to see celebrities pull up to red carpet events in their fuel-efficient hybrid cars. And there is such an abundance of organic and natural skin care products in the pages of fashion magazines that it seems the chemically based, toxic-filled ones stick out like sore thumbs. Even series television has characters carrying their groceries in reusable cloth bags or tossing their cans and bottles into the recycling bin! It may just be a set, but the message comes out loud and clear: Green living just makes sense.

Today, Danny Seo is bringing green living to a whole new level with the publication of this gorgeously photographed lifestyle guide, Simply Green Giving. Green living is chic and fun.

Danny Seo has a flair and talent for mixing green living with a unique and stylish viewpoint on lifestyle in general. For example, he recycles a sheet of newspaper to wrap a bottle of organic wine. Whats extraordinary isnt the fact that he uses newspaperwho hasnt wrapped a gift in the Sunday comics?but how he wraps it. With just a few snips of the scissors, he shows us how to make the top of the bottle look like its overflowing with hundreds of curls. The end result is a wrapped gift that is absolutely gorgeous. And its also one of the greenest ways to wrap a gift.

Or how about his clever gift idea for the holidays: a mimosa kit. Just visit a thrift shop or antique store and pick up an inexpensive Champagne bucket. Fill with organic oranges, a citrus reamer, and a bottle of Champagne, and youve got the perfect, totally useful, and most easy-to-assemble present anyone would love to receive. Danny Seo tells us how some of the worlds finest Champagnes have a history of being organic and how wineries are using modern technology today to avoid using harmful insecticides on their vines. This book is full of a-ha! moments like that.

As president of the Environmental Media Association, I work with the entertainment industry to bring environmental messages to the biggest audience possible, via films and television. These environmental messages are designed to both entertain and educate, and to inspire people to live a greener, leaner life. As I said before, we use celebrities to role-model green behavior and shopping! Danny is someone who shares the same goal as we do: to actively work to protect the biodiversity of the planet, by inspiring people with fun and flair.

I really mean it when I say Dannys book Simply Green Giving is simply perfect. Read it, use it, and share it.

Debbie Levin
President,
Environmental
Media Association

Who hasnt faced this dilemma: figuring out how to wrap a present when there isnt a stitch of gift wrap or ribbon in sight? Perhaps its an unwrapped bottle of wine youre bringing to a dinner party. Or a lovely toy for your nieces birthday. And the granddaddy of them all: the holiday season.

One Christmas, many years ago, I was at home with a stack of presents on the kitchen table. After an exhausting day of shopping for the right presents, I sat there staring at the pile of gifts and wondering who I had forgotten. And it hit me: I failed to pick up gift wrap in my flurry of shopping.

I went back to the store and waited in a long line to buy gift wrap. Standing there, I looked at my arms full of shiny paper, all tightly wound around cardboard tubes with shrink-wrapped plastic on top. I had no idea how much wrapping paper I was actually getting. Once home, I discovered those cardboard tubes are rather deceptive; there seems there was more cardboard tube than actual paper! So, I went back to the store to buy even more wrapping paper. After I was done wrapping all the gifts, I had a mound of wrapping confetti: paper strewn all over the floor along with crumpled cardboard tubes and plastic wrap. I filled up an entire garbage bag full of this stuff and hauled it out to the trash.

Despite the obvious ecological no-no here, I actually thought this small sacrifice for the planet might be worth it when my family saw how lovingly and beautifully I wrapped their presents. I waited for gushes and elation from my family as I handed the gifts out, but was only met with a flurry of hands shredding everything to little pieces. Boxes, ribbons, cards, and paper headed right into the trash. Then it dawned on me that I actually spent money on something that was invented to be ripped up and thrown away. Disgusted with the waste of resources and money, I vowed to never again buy gift wrap, cards, or ribbon.

To me, there is nothing less eco-friendly than wrapping a present. Its just more packaging on top of packaging. But as an environmentalist who is also a lifestyle expert, I find myself at a crossroads. On one hand, I didnt want to be wasteful by buying wrapping paper and ribbon, only to watch it be thrown away. On the other hand, I didnt want to hand an organic wool scarf to my friend, unwrapped, arms extended, and say, Here, happy birthday. Enjoy.

Since that day, finding environmentally friendly alternatives to wrapping paper, ribbon, gift cards, and even the gift itself has been a slight obsession of mine. Ive come up with ideas that have resulted in creations that are ecological andthis is a rather important point heregorgeous. Sure, weve all heard of using newspaper to wrap gifts, but it looks boring and the ink gets all over your hands. There are better ways to do this. Instead, the ideas in this book are easy, affordable (if not free), and still have an element of unexpected surprise that elevates eco gift wrapping to an art form. Ive also figured out clever ways to recycle ribbon, cards, and paper from presents people gave me. I even came up with a few last-minute gift ideas that dont look like an afterthought and are gifts people will actually love.

This book is packed with the best of the best. For example, you can make extraordinary, curly, shiny black bows by breaking open an old VHS tape and using the film inside. Just run strips of the tape along the edge of a sharp scissor and it curls right up. There is almost a limitless amount of this stuff inside of each VHS tape, so go nuts and make the most glamorous, over-the-top bows to adorn any gift. The best part is that it doesnt look recycled, but shiny, chic, and gorgeous.

Warmly,
Danny Seo

The Simply Green book series is printed on recycled content paper and produced without the addition of a dust jacket to save resources. All of the photography is done digitally, eliminating a significant amount of wasteful film and processing, all without sacrificing quality.