Safer Swaps for the College Apartment (Imperfect Edition)
We moved my daughter back to college for her sophomore year a few weeks ago, and it's been a hectic time. A new apartment means lots of shopping for furnishings, and let me tell you, it hasn't been that simple.
For most people, shopping for home furnishings is fairly easy: you find things you like, buy them and that's it. But when you've spent years working in environmental health like I have, it's more challenging. Even though this is a temporary space for the school year, I still wanted to make sure the things in my daughter's room were safer choices.
Does that mean everything is perfect? Nope. But it means we did our best to cut down on exposure to some not-great chemicals that show up in everyday home goods more than people realize. Things like VOCs, flame retardants, PFAS, and formaldehyde which all have well documented links to health issues.
We couldn't do anything about the furniture that came with the apartment, but we've tried to be more thoughtful about what we brought in ourselves. My main goal was to find things with more natural materials, like cotton and linen wherever possible.
Shower curtain fail. We grabbed one I thought was cotton, but realized after I washed it that it wasn't. The shower curtain liner however is made of PEVA, which is an eco-friendly, odorless alternative to traditional PVC vinyl.
Towels. She's using cotton towels that aren't organic but are OEKO-TEX certified (which means the textile has been tested against a list of harmful substances). Ideally for cotton you want GOTS certified (which verifies organic fibers and safer processing) too, but OEKO-TEX is a good option.
Bedding. Mostly of these are from IKEA — duvet, duvet cover, pillows, and the mattress topper. The duvet cover is organic cotton, and while the mattress topper isn't perfect, IKEA has phased out flame retardants and formaldehyde in a lot of their textiles, which makes them an okay option for me. We added some linen decorative pillow covers too. The sheets are cotton but not organic — we couldn't find a patterned organic set she liked — so we made sure they were at least OEKO-TEX certified.
Rug. Last year my daughter and her roommates had a rug in their dorm that smelled so bad, they ended up throwing it out. That "new rug smell" is often VOCs off-gassing. This time we found a rug that's not perfect (it's cotton with a bit of polyester blended in), but we made sure it was free of flame-retardants. A good reminder that "safer" is often about better options, not perfection.
The tricky part for me is balancing affordable with safer materials — it's not always an easy process. I try to look for cotton and linen over synthetics, and skip anything marketed as "water-resistant" or "stain-resistant," since that's usually a red flag for PFAS.
Keeping her healthy from the inside, too. Beyond what's in her room, dorm and apartment life means a lot of shared spaces and a lot of germs. My daughter has started taking BRYTR DAYS for daily nutrituion and keeps elderberry syrup on hand to take if she starts feeling sick. She has an air purifier in her room too. These are just a few things to help her immune system during the school year.
And none of this has to be all-or-nothing. Even small swaps add up.
Want more safer-swap ideas? My ShopMy page has some of my go-to choices across many categories, though not everything from this email is linked there.
And if you want more personalized help figuring out what's actually worth the switch for your own home (or your kid's dorm) — I offer 1:1 help where I do the research for you. You can schedule a call here. ⬇️
