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As founder of The Greenery, global advertising agency Ogilvy's sustainability consulting practice, Freya Williams is an expert in the greening of corporations. She's also a committed Manhattan eco mom bringing up an adorable daughter, Dot. Read on for straight talk from a woman who's truly taking care of business.
What has been your smallest lifestyle change?
I take my own china plate down to the cafeteria at work. I get lots of comments in the elevator: “Hey, that’s so cool, where’d you get the plate?!” Er, it’s a plate.
What was your green tipping point?
As long as I can remember, but (being a walking cliché) I went into overdrive when I was pregnant and things only got worse after I had Dot … After spending my maternity leave at our cottage upstate experimenting with everything from homemade humane mousetraps to lobbying the local supermarket to stop selling Kleenex, I knew there was no way I could go back to the same old advertising. So it was either stay upstate, be a stay-at-home mum and grow vegetables, or go back to work and start a green agency to try and change multinational corporations from the inside. I guess I took the easy option.
"I have a lot of slightly bonkers caftans."
What are your favorite eco items in your closet?
I have a lot of slightly bonkers caftans and ‘70s dresses mostly discovered in charity shops in the UK. My favorite is a floor-length green floral Frank Usher number. Very Abigail’s Party.
What’s your favorite eco element of your home?
The home itself: our lovingly restored 1880s wooden cottage. It still has mostly the original leaded glass in the windows, all original wide board floors, and I don’t think there’s a single item of new furniture in the place.
Freya Williams
Founder, Ogilvy's The Greenery
"I knew there was no way I could go back."
What’s your little green secret?
I compost Dot’s diapers in the wormery upstate. She wears Nature Baby, which are biodegradable.
What’s on your recommended reading list?
It’s a bit predictable, but I’m obsessed with the whole food thing at the moment so anything by Michael Pollan, The End of Food by Paul Roberts and Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver. And go see Wall-E.
What’s on your wish list?
Growing some of our own food. I like to think of myself as someone who would do this but the truth is I’ve never grown a single thing so I’m a bit scared of it. Someone suggested Tub Gardening for Dummies, which I think is about my speed.
"At the time I thought it was geeky. Now I know better."
Who is your green superhero?
My grandpa used to keep every elastic band, plastic bag, and scrap of paper he came across in a drawer under the oven. He composted everything and the crusts of his bread and bacon rinds all went to the birds … When I visited I’d be presented with the water bottle I’d thrown away the last time, fished out of the bin, washed and refilled to use again. His sweaters had patches on the elbows and he darned his socks, or my granny did. At the time I thought it was geeky. Now I know better.
