Posch make wrapping eco with vintage scarfs

Wrapping Christmas pressies in old newspapers makes you look like a cheapskate rather than a nature-lover trying to save paper and trees. But thanks to the creative brains behind the Canadian eco-design company, Posch, we can shun the newspapers this year and give friends and family a stylish surprise by wrapping their gifts in amazing vintage scarves.

The Biota gift wrappings, as Posch calls the scarves, are made from vintage, hand-printed silk that can be used again and again -- either as gift wrappings or as unique accessories. At around £7 a piece, the Biota scarves might seem an expensive wrapping material, but there are just so many good things about Biota that we think they're worth it.

Luce Beaulieu from Posch tells SmartPlanet that the original wraps are bought either from The Salvation Army, or from a social economy organisation called Certex Canada, which creates jobs for disadvantaged people. Every piece is then printed locally, but using traditional Japanese methods.

Beaulieu explains Biota's eco message: "We hope that a certain amount of irresponsible wrapping paper -- both during the holidays and afterwards -- will be saved from the landfills through the sales of our wraps and we also hope to create awareness that virgin fibre paper is NOT a good way to give gifts and that reusable alternatives do exist."

And Posch is happy to spread the idea, whether you decide to buy Biota or not. Beaulieu promises that the folding instructions will be available on the website "to empower people with little money to reuse their own fabrics into a reusable wrapping", as Beaulieu says.

She adds that Posch will donate five per cent of Biota's sales to WWF and that all the paper used for packaging for shipping is the environmentally friendly, Canadian Enviro100. So long newspapers.

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