Press Release: SSF Announces 2006 Outstanding Sustainable Style Achievement Award Nominees

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Media Contact: Collin Dunn
Sustainable Style Foundation

T: 206.324.4850

Sustainable Style Foundation Announces Nominees for the 2006 Outstanding Sustainable Style Achievement (OSSA) Awards
Nonprofit organization helps promote sustainability as the most exciting and important style innovation of the 21st century

Seattle, WA -- July 19, 2006 -- The Sustainable Style Foundation (SSF) today announced the nominees of its 3rd annual Outstanding Sustainable Style Achievement (OSSA) Awards program, recognizing the best in sustainable style for 2005. Ten recipients will be selected from more than 60 nominees (listed below) and announced in SSF’s online publication, SASS Magazine. Three Premier Award winners will also be featured, and were pre-announced today. These award recipients are Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream (Vision & Innovation Award), Prince Charles & Lady Camilla (Outstanding Public Expression Award) and Angelina Jolie, with SSF’s highest honor, the Style & Substance Award in honor of Audrey Hepburn.

All nominees and winners will be featured on SSF’s online publication, SASS Magazine, available at sustainablestyle.org, which serves its members as the ultimate resource guide of popular culture and personal lifestyle choices addressing the many pressing social and environmental challenges facing our world.

"The OSSA Awards recognize outstanding social and environmental efforts across style industries that help us all 'look fabulous, live well and do good'", said Rebecca Luke, Co-founder and Senior Stylist at SSF. "This is a landmark third year for SSF as we continue to our bring community organizations, businesses and government together in demonstrating how the expression of individual lifestyle choices can help make positive changes in our world."

A selection committee made up of accomplished social and environmental leaders, educators, and “sustainable style” practitioners will evaluate the nominees and select a winner in each category based on the following criteria:

  • Effective use of popular culture. How effectively nominees use popular culture/media to inspire mainstream consumers to make more sustainable personal lifestyle choices.
  • Future innovation. How nominee’s achievement drives further innovation in specific industries or across other design industries.
  • Depth of achievement. The significance of the achievement, particularly with respect to available resources or prior achievements of the company or organization.
  • Overall impact. The level of interest created and its long-lasting appeal.

Said Steve Voiland, President of SSF’s International Board of Directors, "Recognition & Inspiration is one of the three program areas for Sustainable Style Foundation. This year, we wanted our focus to be solely on the award nominees and winners using this opportunity to 'nourish the seeds of sustainability' through recognition, encouraging further efforts in this area."

The 2006 OSSA Award nominees are:

Communication & Communication Design

  • Dwell Magazine for their Dec 2005/Jan 2006 "Green is Good" Issue
  • Greenlight Magazine, for launching their very green online publication
  • Sublime, for publishing "the first international ethical lifestyle magazine"
  • Salon.com and Rolling Stone for their "Climate Warriors & Heroes" special report

Designed Environments

  • Team led by Matthew Coates and Tim Meldrum, for winning the international Cradle to Cradle Home Design and Construction Competition
  • Volvo, for announcing plans to build the world’s first CO2-free auto plant
  • Wal-mart, for opening a green superstore in McKinney, Texas

Entertainment

  • Urban Outfitters and Filter Magazine for their CD benefiting UNICEF and tsunami relief
  • Cameron Diaz and MTV for the show "Trippin'"
  • Destiny's Child for their song "Stand Up for Love," an anthem for World Children's Day
  • PBS for their documentary "Global Warming - The Signs and Science" narrated by Alanis Morissette
  • Participant Productions and Warner Bros Studios for the movie "Syriana"

Fashion & Beauty

  • Linda Loudermilk, for her 2005 lines of eco-coutour clothing featured at New York fashion week, and for opening her eco-boutique in L.A.
  • Bono, Ali Hewson and Rogan Gregory for Edun, their line of sweatshop-free apparel
  • Druide, for being the first company in North America to have its products certified "ecological and organic"
  • Polo Jeans, for their "G.I.V.E. - When Style Meets Substance" Campaign
  • SalvationSacks, for starting a company with dedication to recycling through the creation of individually designed accessories

Food & Restaurant

  • Starbucks Coffee Co., for purchasing 5% of the kilowatt hours used in 6,376 company-owned stores in North America
  • Safeway, for purchasing enough renewable energy to power all the companies fuel stations in the US and 15 grocery stores in San Francisco
  • New Belgium Brewery, for using 40% less energy per barrel of output than the average American brewer and supplying 60% of its own power
  • Appellation Wine & Spirits, for opening the first wine shop in NYC to focus on selling organic & biodynamic wines
  • Bon Appetit Management Company, for sponsoring and organizing the "Eat Local Challenge" where 150,000 diners at restaurants from Seattle to Washington D.C. had the option to eat a 100 percent locally grown meal, made entirely of ingredients from within 150 miles of the kitchen where they are served. The event took place September 29, 2005.
  • LocalHarvest.org, for expanding their website directory of local farms, sustainable agriculture, farmer's markets and restaurants to over 9000 sources across the country.

Industrial Design & Consumer Products

  • Angela Adams, for producing her rugs in partnership with RUGMARK to end illegal child labor
  • Whole Foods Market, for opening their very hip sustainable lifestyle store, the first of its kind, in Hollywood
  • McDonough Braungart Design Chemistry for their Cradle to Cradle certification program
  • Apple, for announcing and implementing its iPod recycling program

Mobility

  • Honda, for introducing the Accord hybrid
  • Ford, for introducing the first hybrid SUV, the Escape
  • Lexus, for offering the RX400h, the world’s first luxury SUV hybrid
  • Mercedes, for offering a vegan option in all their cars
  • OZOcar, for offering the first eco-luxury car service in New York City

Sports

  • HillBilly Wax-Works for producing the first eco-friendly ski and snowboard wax
  • Stopglobalwarming.org, NativeEnergy, the Philadelphia Eagles and St. Louis Rams for the first climate-neutral football game
  • Clif Bar, for partnering with the 2006 Golden Eagle Awards program, which honors the nation’s most eco-friendly ski resorts

Travel

  • Airbus, for producing the A380, the world’s most environmentally friendly airplane
  • Pineapple Hospitality, for offering dozens of 100-percent biodegradable guest toiletries and other sustainable hotel amenities
  • Hyatt Hotels, for running two Dallas-area hotels on 100-percent renewable energy
  • Royal Caribbean, for receiving the Kuoni Travel Group's 2005 Green Planet Award for environmental excellence and innovation

Nonprofit

  • National Environmental Trust, Breast Cancer Fund and Breast Cancer Action for their efforts to secure passage of the California Safe Cosmetics Act of 2005
  • Architecture for Humanity for Project Re:Build benefitting tsunami victims in Sri Lanka and India, for their post-Hurricane Katrina work, and for working with Kashmir earthquake victims
  • Ricky Martin Foundation for his post-tsunami work in Sri Lanka
  • American Red Cross and Salvation Army for "Shelter from the Storm: A Concert for the Gulf Coast" that raised approximately $30 million for relief from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita
  • The ONE campaign, founded by 11 global non-profits to fight the emergency of global AIDS and extreme poverty

In addition to the 10 award recipients, three premier award honorees will be announced:

The Vision & Innovation Award will be presented to Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream, for their social and environmental leadership and vision to improve the quality of life for people around the world through their progressive and sustainable business practices. The Award recognizes an individual, organization or company that has demonstrated ongoing leadership and vision in a style/design industry. The recipient is selected by the SSF boards and advisors following nominations from the SSF membership.

The Outstanding Public Expression Award will be presented to His Royal Highness, Charles, Prince of Whales and Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall for their high-profile visits to organic farms in California and their outspoken support of organic farming in 2005. This Award recognizes outstanding efforts by a celebrity, style professional or public figure that uses their high profile position to bring attention to pressing social and/or environmental issues. The recipient is also selected by the SSF boards and advisors following nominations from the SSF membership.

The Style & Substance Award in honor of Audrey Hepburn will be presented to Angelina Jolie. Because the late Audrey Hepburn originally inspired the Award as an actress and UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador who worked to raise awareness of the plight of children around the world, last year the SSF Board of Directors chose resolutely to present the first Style & Substance Award to Ms. Hepburn through the Audrey Hepburn Children’s fund established in her honor. For 2006 the SSF Board could not pass up the opportunity to honor Angelina Jolie with this year’s Style & Substance Award for her work as a concerned global citizen and active United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Goodwill Ambassador. The Style & Substance Award is SSF's highest honor and recognizes outstanding efforts by a celebrity, style professional or public figure improving the quality of life for children around the world.

The OSSA Awards were launched in 2004 at an event at the Gibson Guitar Showroom in Beverly Hills, where invited guests gathered to hear the honorable mentions for the first OSSA Awards recipients. LOHAS 9 was the venue for the 2nd annual OSSA Awards, when nominees gathered for the official announcement and a chance to walk away with an award. This year, SSF will hold a virtual event, announcing the awards through their online publication, SASS Magazine. The award recipients will be presented with their awards by SSF Co-Founders and/or Style Ambassadors after the official announcement, early in August.

For more information on the OSSA Awards, please see: sustainablestyle.org/ossa-awards

About Sustainable Style Foundation
The Sustainable Style Foundation (SSF) is an international member-based nonprofit organization that uses the combined power of popular culture and personal lifestyle choices to address the many pressing social and environmental challenges facing our world. "By combining our efforts across the style industries and giving people the understanding on how they can effect change even with simple choices such as the coffee they drink and the clothes they wear, we will ultimately save this world for our next generation," states Sean Schmidt, Co-founder and Style Ambassador of SSF.

From fashion, food and film to interior design, architecture, travel, music and more, SSF has designs on making sustainability the most exciting and important style innovation of the 21st century.
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