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‘An economy where product-as-a-service is just a tiny cog in a machine with endlessly reusable – instead of disposable – resources and materials’
CONSCIOUS HOTEL Like many save-the-world ventures, this three-branch (soon to be four) Amsterdam hotel chain was born after co-owner Marco Lemmers became a parent and started thinking about his baby’s dismal prospects on Planet Earth. ‘More hip than hippie… eco-friendly but not eco-fundamentalist’, the eco-design Conscious Hotels run on renewable energy, feature smart showerheads, LED lighting, and furniture made from recycled yoghurt pots and coffee cup holders. Not convinced? There’s a hive for wild bees on their green roof, they serve organic locally-sourced food, and their latest outpost (near Vondelpark), named The Tire Station in deference to former owners Michelin, boasts eco patisserie Sticky Fingers. Lemmers and partner Sam Cohen made a conscious choice to reduce their carbon footprint so we can, too. conscioushotels.com
MEDIAMATIC ETEN Taking the sustainable, organic and locally-produced and -sourced trend one step further down the mulched path, Mediamatic ETEN, part of the all-encompassing Mediamatic cultural institution, makes use of aquaponics to grow its own edible flowers and herbs. In its greenhouse overlooking the IJ waterway, Mediamatic ETEN cultivates fish and plants together, with the waste of the fish being used to fertilise the plants that in turn purify the water for our aquatic friends. That circular system produces the greenery that graces their creative, mostly-vegan, brickoven pizzas (think: fermented black bean, local oyster mushrooms and roasted garlic – yum!) or the catfish in brine that comes from the aquaponic system and was likely caught by Piet Ruijter, the ‘last standing fisherman of Amsterdam’, who you might just glimpse from the greenhouse’s terrace plying his not-yet-lost trade in the IJ. eten.mediamatic.nl