We're trying our best to preserve our beautiful world, but there's always more that can be done and we'd love to hear your views too.
We believe in design with a conscience which means we run our business according to ethical, environmental and philanthropic principles. We are committed to looking after our community and the natural world, and we champion diversity and inclusion.
We have established five guiding principles which govern everything we do here at The Monkey Puzzle Tree – from the way we seek out our incredible artists to the way we manufacture. Below, we sum up the four key pillars of our pledge to you…
We are championing transparency as the best way to improve sustainability in our industry.
We now name all the mills we use at each stage of the manufacture of our designs alongside as much information we have about raw materials, dyes and inks under the 'Sourcing & Sustainability' tab of each product listing. We also state the standards that the products meet.
This is gives us the best motivation to improve each step of the process, and means that you can check out that our claims are true.
And as an unexpected benefit, our lovely local mills have told us that they have already benefitted from this publicity by gaining extra customers.
As an ethical brand, we promise to make all our fabrics, wallpapers and cushions to the highest possible environmental standards. Our studio is powered by green energy, and we try and keep our car use to a minumum and produce very little waste.
Where possible we use natural fibres which are biodegradable. Our cork is grown chemical free in Portugal, and our linen is also from Europe. All the wood pulp in our papers in FSC certified.
We also think it's really important that our fabrics are hardwearing, and that's why we will sometimes use a blend of fibres to increase the life of the fabric.
At the moment we are posting out our rolls of fabric with an outer layer of plastic to ensure that they arrive with you in optimum condition and are not damaged in transit or by damp.
We'd love to hear if anyone has come across a more environmentally friendly alternative we could adopt, please send us your ideas!
The connection to manufacturing runs deep within our Yorkshire roots. Our founder, Charlotte, experienced first-hand the decimation of the industry when the Leeds tannery in which she worked closed down in the mid-Noughties. And both her husband and father-in-law once worked in the steel industry.
To help celebrate and sustain manufacturing in the North, all our products are designed and made within 100 miles of our Leeds studio.
Making locally reduces our carbon footprint as well as supporting local skills and jobs.
In Britain we have more stringent controls and regulations for chemical use and waste processing than many parts of the world, and a higher proportion of our energy comes from renewable sources.
We love being able to pop in and meet the people making our designs too!
Playing our small role in continuing this precious and long-running part of the North of England's heritage.
In order to support our artists and provide them with something akin to a small salary each month, we pay them a 20% royalty. We feel this is a generous and appropriate way to value their work and enable them to continue to create new, surprising and beautiful designs.
And as part of our ‘Donate Don’t Discount' approach, we give back to our local community by donating 20% of our takings over the Black Friday weekend to local homeless charity Homeless Street Angels.
We are committed to diversity at The Monkey Puzzle Tree, broadening our approach to ensure that Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic artists are represented within our collective.
Taking this approach not only better reflects our diverse community, but also allows us to seek out ever more unusual and inspirational starting points for our designs. We are also fully signed up members of the Design For Diversity pledge established by interior designer Rukmini Patel and interiors journalist Kate Watson-Smyth to address inequalities in the design industry.
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