The topic of environmental sustainability is certainly one of the most pervasive themes at the present time, involving every aspect of our daily lives and the way we experience spaces. Concepts such as eco-sustainable production, sourcing recyclable materials, and the use of renewable energy have rightfully become part of best practice in furnishing, to be followed when designing a green kitchen. It is not just a matter linked to current trends.
Today, given the climate emergency, we are all expected to make our contribution by choosing products and materials that are more conducive to the wellness of our planet. In this article you will discover which materials, due to their properties, characteristics and manufacturing processes, can truly make a difference and be defined as eco-sustainable.
Which characteristics should a sustainable kitchen have?
Our green kitchen should, first of all, be energy efficient: for example, it will use renewable energy sources and have a well-designed layout for waste management. In addition, its upgrade will include the use of energy-efficient technology, appliances and lighting systems. Another very important aspect to consider is the choice of recycled materials (such as wood and steel) for furniture and accessories, and innovative, eco-compatible, high-performance, health-friendly materials (such as Cosmolite® slabs) for kitchen surfaces and cladding. Let’s examine the most sophisticated solutions in the latter cases.
Sustainability and innovative materials for surfaces and cladding in a green kitchen
As we have seen up to now, there are many aspects to be taken into consideration when creating a sustainable kitchen. However, it is important to remember that not all materials on the market can seamlessly combine visual appeal and technical properties, while also meeting eco-sustainability standards. So it is necessary to obtain information on the materials’ properties by researching all the manufacturing processes that hallmark the selected products. During this phase, material innovation plays a crucial role. Materials such as lava stone, eco-mortar, and the new eco-resins can be viable alternatives when it comes to sustainability, but they are accompanied by severe limitations from a design point of view. In fact, these materials do not offer a wide variety of finishes and color uniformity, and as a result they do not have the aesthetic qualities that are required when designing a new kitchen.
“Manufacturing in harmony with nature and, at the same time, endeavoring to create products that correspond to the principles of beauty and originality of Italian-made products”.
This is the concept underpinning the Materia Nuova (New Material) manufactured by Stone Italiana, which fully reflects the union between design and sustainability: Cosmolite®. Compared with the alternatives we have just examined, Cosmolite® has better technical characteristics. Thanks to careful research into raw materials and a high-tech manufacturing process, each individual characteristic is brought to the optimum level in both technical and visual-design terms.
Cosmolite®: the “sustainable” revolution by Stone Italiana
Cosmolite® represents a choice whose objective is to revolutionize the interior design landscape in the kitchen while reducing environmental impact. In fact, its Carbon Footprint declaration shows a measurement almost 45% lower when compared to other products in the industry. Available in five different collections – COSMO, METEOR, PLANET, K-STAR, and VENANTIS – Cosmolite® surfaces are all comprised entirely of pre-consumer recycled aggregates other than quartz.
As regards technical properties, the surfaces made by Stone Italiana reach very high standards of resistance to scratches, stains and impacts, and they meet international requirements for reliability and food safety (in fact, Stone Italiana’s materials hold NSF/ANSI Std. 51 National Sanitation Foundation – Food Equipment Materials certification for the splash zone and food zone, the most comprehensive certification for materials in contact with foodstuffs). Cosmolite® does not offer only technical advantages, but also design benefits: Stone Italiana’s ongoing experimentation on colors, textures and grain sizes makes it possible to create environmentally-friendly surfaces that meet the most sophisticated requirements in terms of visual appearance and design. In fact, Stone Italiana offers a very wide range of colors: its finishes range from more classic, glossy collections in neutral tones to more intense and matt shades.
