The Organic Traveller
Tuesday, 12 October 2021

Nuremberg: Sustainable, organic and eco fashion

Apart from the omnipresent fast fashion stores of H&M and C&A where it is, according to Greenpeace's Detox Catwalk, morally acceptable to buy cheap organic clothes, Nuremberg offers a selection of concept stores of smaller independent fashion labels with sustainable approaches. Although very different they have something in common: awareness for the environmental and social impact of fashion right from the start, durable products eco-consciously made in Europe, and slower fashion cycles. Of course, all of them sell online as well.

For streetware and young designer labels opt for Glore north of Weißer Turm, on your way downhill to the river Pegnitz. This is the place to look for fresh, exciting styles and vegan fashion, both, for men and women. All items on sale are certified, bearing trustworthy organic and fair-trade labels. They also have a small range of organic bodycare on sale.

Colourful ethno-inspired clothes for women, predominantly made from organic materials can be found at Gudrun Sjödén at the eastern end of Josephsplatz. The Swedish designer is an eco fashion pioneer, and presents her collections on models of all ages. Apart from clothes you will also find home textiles.

A few steps away in north-eastern direction, south of Karlsbrücke you'll find Deerberg, a concept store of a family-run business which started as a mail order firm for sustainably produced shoe-wear. Since they have been extending into clothes for women sustainably made in Europe which is the focus of the store. Unfortunately there are still few organically produced textiles, and the styles are comparatively boring, but the shoes are worth a look as long as you do not shun leather.

Lysu

For children step by Lysu, a cosy specialised shop offering fairly traded clothes, toys and accessories made from organic and natural materials for babies, toddlers, pre-school and elementary school kids. The shop is tucked away in Obere Wörthstraße, on the southern shore of the river Pegnitz, opposite the Trödelmarkt island. Like many other small shops also this one is closed on Mondays.

2021-10-12 13:00:00 [Nuremberg, organic, fashion, shoes, fair, vegan, bodycare, shopping, covid, corona] Link

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Wednesday, 23 December 2020

Munich: Organic Living Rooms

In theory we all love them: The small owner-driven shops that surprise us with their unusual selection or combination of goods and food made with love and care, vibrant places with a special and welcoming atmosphere or homely places of peace where we can sit and wonder and get inspired. Shops who's owners create a place from their ideas of a human world, who are ready for a chat if desired but not pushy in their sales attitude. Places that are somehow home away from home, places for a rest or for inspiration. Places where we hopefully buy stuff since we're not forcibly persuaded by aggressive marketing.

And yes. There are these places, and it doesn't come as a surprise that many of these shops offer organic items.

Books and more

Imagine the dry fruit and sweets display of an oriental bazaar stall, and put it in the middle of a crammed book shop filled with mediavistic, orientalistic and cooking literature. When it's possible again sit down in front of the shop or at the single bar table inside and order oriental-style coffee, tea, and mezze. Have a chat with the owner and scroll the book shelves while you wait -- you will find interesting media on medieval arts and crafts, food, biographies of historic persons, films, facts and fiction in German, English, and even French. Your meal -- the falafel, perhaps a soup -- will be fully organic as are the drinks and the home-made dried fruit.

Before covid-19 Saladins Souk in Haidhausen was also a reliable source of sweets imported from Damaskus, and along-side earthen oil lamps and artisanally produced soaps from both, the Provence as well as the now sadly destroyed soap shops in Aleppo, you will find (usually conventional) delicatessen from French supermarkets. The shop (also dubbed Haidhauser Oase as the blackboards in front of it have it) can be found in the beautiful and relaxed part of Haidhausen a few minutes North-West from Ostbahnhof station. Be prepared to find an always changing display of (not always organic) delicatessen often brought by the owner from his travels or made by his friends. The deep-fried lunch items are prepared healthily in a low-fat fryer, and birch sugar is used as sweetener throughout the menu. You can also order lunch delivery as long as you phone in between 10 and 12 am. During the corona year of 2020 the shop had been closed a lot, but the shop-owner confirmed the shop was to open again January 4th, 2021.

Love to sit down with a good book and a glass of good wine? No question, the two are a perfect match, and even if you're more into an organic softdrink (Bionade), the Buchhandlung Lentner bookstore near Rosenheimer Platz with its cosy cafe is a place where you can stay for hours sitting, watching, chatting with the staff and reading. If you're not able to read German shop of their carefully selected wines, some of them organic. They will also order English books for you (send e-mail, phone in or use their webshop in advance), but this may sometimes take longer than the usual overnight order service for German books. Unfortunately, neither the coffee nor the milk are organic, but if you ask they'll perhaps offer it next time.

Closed

2020-12-23 10:00:00 [Munich, Haidhausen, organic, cafe, coffee, tea, deli, books, lunch, delivery, fashion, French, falafel, shopping, covid, corona] Link

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Saturday, 16 November 2019

Mannheim: Sustainable Shopping

If you prefer to set out on a shopping spree on a bicycle and prefer a rented bike that is not tracking you pay a visit to Fahrrad Schieber, a more than one hundred years local bicycle workshop located a few steps from the Wasserturm landmark within the squared part of town, the "Quadrate". For 10 EUR a day (as of 2019) you will be provided with a well maintained used bike. If it against all odds breaks during your trip, do not hesitate to step by, it will be fixed promptly.

HautNah

Founded almost 25 years ago your first stop could be HautNah, a fashion boutique specializing in ecologically and fairly produced clothes made from natural materials. The shop is a member of the International Association of Natural Textiles (iVN) and aims at those looking for classical long-living cuts rather than at cutting-edge fashionistas (for trending fashion you may try the shops listed below). Needless to say that HautNah also offers an assortment of healthy outfits for babies and toddlers.

For shoes proceed a few steps along the Kaiserring to Fußspur ("foot trace"), a small local chain specialising in environmentally friendly produced and European-made shoes.

Leaving the ring road and entering the Quadrate through Kunststraße you'll find a tea shop of the Tee Gschwendtner franchise. Although this specialist chain is selling conventionally produced teas and tisanes in the first place its shops have proved to be a trustworthy source of organic teas and herbal infusions for years. You can buy all kinds of loose teas and herbal infusions as well as high quality tea bags and even pre-fab iced teas, and there will usually be organic options. Although most teas will be filled into bags before your eyes there's always a minimum quantum you have to buy (usually 50 or 100 grams), and you have to buy standardized packages (bigger sizes being 250 or 500 grams).

Umgekrempelt

Even longer west in the Quadrate area, located between the castle and parade square the new Umgekrempelt ("rolled up" and/or "turned inside out") clothes boutique offers both, fairly traded and organic slow fashion as well as a repair service and upcycling workshops. In addition you'll find a lot of accessoiries and gifts here, and even plastics-free degradable glitter. Note that this likeable shop keeps closed both, on Mondays and for a (rather late) lunch break.

Wohnhunger

Leaving the Quadrate for the eastern part of town the Wohnhunger gift shop next to Eddie's zero waste supermarket offers a selection of organic delicatessen like coffee, soups, chocolates, liquors, herbs and spices, some zero-waste items like natural soap and cotton dish washing clothes and a lot of other cosy things. Unfortunately the organic coffee isn't used at the coffee bar, and the milk for the coffee drinks isn't organic. About three years ago the shop also offered an organic soup or stew for lunch, but these are songs from the past.

On your way you'll also pass Weinrefugium, an upmarket, carefully designed wine shop offering a good selection of natural and organic wines. (For more and only organic wines visit the Bittersüß delicatessen in Neckarau.)

More to try

Here's a list of shops which I had on my list for research but didn't manage to visit myself. Let me know about your experience!

Greenwashed

The city's online tourist guide suggests to get yourself a "bio" picnic basket for a stroll at the embankments. Don't fall for it! The only organic items that come with this "Wellness-Korb für Vegetarier" are two bottles of the organic bionade soft drink:

Closed

The following places do no longer exist, although you still might find references to them on the web:

2019-11-16 14:15:01 [Mannheim, organic, shopping, organic, fair, fashion, shoes, spices, delicatessen, gifts, bodycare, coffee, tea, cycling, zero_waste, wine, bicycle] Link

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Sunday, 23 June 2019

Organic Chioggia and Sottomarina

Whether you're after a noisy beach holiday at the Adriatic coast or want to escape the buzz of Venice but stay within the Venetian magic -- the former fisher town of Chioggia with the suburb of Sottomarina and its beach is definitely worth a visit. It's easy to reach by local train from Rovigo -- a travel back in time with noisy cars, some of them without air conditioning, where you open the windows in the vain hope that the hot summer wind will refresh you --, bicycle or bus no 11 from Lido SME. The latter travels on board of a ro-ro ferry at the south-end of the Lido di Venezia at Alberoni over to the isle of Pellestrina. At the ferry terminal next to the Pellestrina graveyard, Cimitero Pellestrina, the bus ends and you go on board of the waterbus ferry with the same name, to Chioggia.

If coming by bicycle from Venezia Santa Lucia train station take the ferry no. 17 from Tronchetto to Lido San Nicolo (from the train station you must carry your bike over the steps of the Ponte della Costituzione bridge), and simply follow the direction of the bus (the bicycle route over the islands is properly marked). You will also take the ro-ro ferry from Alberoni and later the waterbus from Pellestrina to Chioggia. For persons the ferries are covered by the ACTV day, two-days and three-days passes bought in Venice but you have to buy additional bicyles tickets at one EUR per bike and ferry ride.

Where to stay

Unfortunately I wasn't able to find any places to eat and stay with a throughout trustworthy eco-conscious mindset. The nearest you get for a sustainable overnight stay is Hotel Mediterraneo, directly located at Sottomarina's beach promenade, the Lungomare Adriatico. The hotel with its pleasant rooftop terrace carries the Legambiente ecolabel for sustainable tourism. However: The promised organic breakfast was predominantly conventional, with the notable exceptions of -- unfortunately prepackaged -- rice wafers and rusk (the latter was also available in a conventional variety), organic honey, and two types of (yummy) organic biscuits. Neither the tea bags, the bread nor the milk were organic, and the coffee from the automatic machine completely undrinkable for Italian standards. The hotel itself certainly fullfills higher eco demands than average, but they easily could do better introducing waste separation, re-usable toothbrush tumblers and natural body care on the rooms, and of course by raising the number of organic products notably.

Smarthotel Mediterraneo

Having said this, the hotel manager, Sonia, was cordial and helpful, the room clean and suitable for a family, with actual sea view, and sufficiently isolated against the noises of the beach party places -- off-season. The washing and cleaning detergents used on the room as well as on the bed linen and towels did not leave disturbing remainders of artificial perfumes. The a la carte menu on the hotel's restaurant, Saporoso, was done by a skilled chef which should better have had organic ingredients at hand, to enhance the taste to very good.

Where to eat

Sad to say but if you really want to eat organic you have to buy your own food for a pic-nic -- at least I wasn't able to spot at minimum predominantly organic eateries or restaurants. Let me know if you find one!

Your next best bet may be Pizza Fantasy, a beach shack pizza restaurant next to the Astoria Village pleasure ground at the Lungomare. On occasions they seem to use organic wholemeal flour and olive oil for the dough, and this may point to a generally more conscious mindset. However I wasn't able to confirm the general use of organic ingredients.

Tentazioni Tipiche

For lunch you may also check out the sandwiches at Tentazioni Tipiche in the old town of Chioggia a few steps from the ACTV ferry stop, but again I cannot say how reliably they contain (or rather: not) organic produce.

Ice-cream

The tour through the ice-cream parlours near Sottomarina beach starts with a case of greenwashing: L'Arte del Gelato da Marco e Giulio advertises to use organic milk, but take this with a grain of salt: The 10 liters milk boxes by Parmalat delivered to the place were without doubt not lavelled organic. The ice-cream and the frozen yogurt are nevertheless smooth and easily palatable, though too sweet for my taste. None of the toppings for the frozen yogurt were organic. They take 1.80 EUR for a generous small serving of ice-cream, and 2.50 EUR for a small frozen yogurt with two toppings. The queue during evening hours makes it easy to identify this place on Piazza Italia.

L'Arte del Gelato

A few steps along the roundabout, and you'll find L'Oasi del Gelato. The ice-cream here still looks very conventional, but for 2019 the owners promised to start using organic products -- organic milk in general, but also (on occasions) organic strawberries. How far they've already embraced this path I cannot say, but: Keep on going!

The Grom chain of ice-cream parlours stopped promising organic ingredients in 2019 (except for the milk in the milk shakes), but for the records: Yes, there's a Grom branch at the Lungomare.

Shopping: Groceries, delicatessen and gifts

The best source of organic food I could find is just around the corner from the ice-cream parlours at the Piazza Italia roundabout: Nuovi Sapori da Laura e Elena is a small, Sunday-open convenience store offering organic milk (the very lattebusche milk promised by the L'Oasi gelateria), juices, cheese, cookies, jam, wine, a good selection of dry food, and more -- you'll have to check for organic labels and ask at the cheese-and-meat counter.

The traditional Italian Tentazioni Tipiche delicatessen at the northern end of Corso del Popolo next to Palazzo delle Figure in the old town of Chioggia is another small grocery offering a -- rather limited -- range of organic (dry) food.

Altromercato Chioggia

For organic and fairly traded bodycare (though no sun cream), dry food, sweets, preserves, wine, soft drinks, fairly traded fashion accessoiries and gifts head to the southern end of the corso: The Altromercato Commercio equo e sociale also stocks (not always certified organic) products of territories freed from the mafia, under the Libera Terra ("freed land") label.

More organic body care, using hemp as an ingredient, and other (partially organic) hemp products can be found at Canapa for you in Sottomarina which I did not have time to visit.

Some organic products are also available from the Supercoffeeshop coffee bar in Sottomarina. The coffee probably isn't organic, and I cannot say anything about the milk since I could not make it there.

If you are adventurous try to find Le verdure di Marco e Camilla in the old town of Chioggia, supposedly a quite new full-blown organic grocery also selling fresh organic fruits and veges. I did not have the time to find the place, so please let me know if you know where exactly it is located.

More to try

2019-06-23 08:00:01 [Chioggia, Sottomarina, biologico, organic, ice-cream, supermarkets, grocery, bicycle, hotel, accommodation, fair, gifts, shopping, bodycare, coffee, cafe, hemp] Link

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Wednesday, 07 September 2016

Kochi (Cochin): Conscious shopping

Tea and spices

On your way along the coast from Bellar Road via Calvetty Road and along Bazar Road you will find quite a few shops advertising organic spices and perfumes. In a country where adulteration of spices for profit is frequent one should take this with a grain of salt -- usually you won't find any organic certification. Use your wits and enquire, in the end you will have to believe or let go. Since Kerala still has a lot of farmers abiding to traditional agricultural principles there is however a good chance that some of the spices actually are grown organically.

The spice we were taught to be extremely picky about by an organic farmer we met at Thanal Organic Bazaar in Trivandrum is cardamom, a very demanding crop: In order to retain spotless green capsules almost all farmers who depend on selling their crops to make a living apply pesticides every 20 days, making it one of the most exposed spices. So when you shop for it check whether you can find capsules with sand coloured areas in the batch. If so the claim to be organic might hold true.

On the seaside of Bazar Road (left-hand when heading South) you will find Hi' Range Organic Spices (the spelling varies), a micro-loan financed cooperative of seven local women trading in a huge variety of Kerala spices, tea and natural body care products. They claim its all natural and organic, and since the prepackaged teabags in fact sport an organic label, I'd opt to believe it. I also liked that the woman I talked to did not try to persuade me into buying but instead explained which type of curcuma to use in cooking and which one for skin care, or demonstrated how to shell a nutmeg.

Books

By far the finest bookstore in and around Kochi is Idiom Booksellers in Bastian Street. Apart from a brilliant selection of contemporary Indian literature, classics, graphic novels, books on local history, art, culture and cooking as well as travel and children books and postcards you can buy beautiful notebooks, handmade from recycled paper. Even if you otherwise do your reading on electronic devices step by and let you inspire by the crammed shelves and their book-loving proprietor. She will even ship your purchase overseas. Idiom has never been a place handing out bags made from plastic foil but since plastic bags have been banned within the boundaries of Fort Kochi since spring 2016 you can carry your purchase home in a handmade coarse jute bag instead of one made from synthetic fabrics -- just like 15 years ago.

Fashion

With -- at the time of writing -- five outlets in the greater Kochi area Fabindia inevitably has an extravagant showroom near the North-Western shore of Fort Kochi.

Lesser known, although being a pioneer of fairly traded fashion in India is Rajastan-based Anokhi with its flower-printed signature designs mixing Indian and Western styles. In Fort Kochi they run an exquisite boutique near Parade Ground. If you happen to come to Jaipur step by their cafe serving predominantly organic international food.

Tribes India, a shop run by the government of India to support indigenious artisans next to Fort Cochin Post Office offers handmade clothes, fabrics, nice bags made from banana fibre and other artefacts made from natural materials as well as metal figurines and a range of other artisanal products. Although the billboards advertise organic items they do no longer trade in spices, preserves and other food items. Its a comfortable place to shop for fairly traded gifts, though.

2016-09-07 16:00:07 [Kochi, Cochin, Rajastan, Jaipur, organic, gifts, tea, fashion, spices, shopping] Link

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This work by trish is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. For commercial use contact the author: E-mail · Mastodon · Vero · Ello.