I have fiberglass planters because I could easily carry them out of the store and move them around once filled.

I would have an artificial tree right now we have nothing because of the cat.

I have wallpaper that looks like silk but it's vinyl because it is in a stairwell and it can be washed.

I would have LVP under the right circumstances, particularly if they made patterns that looked like site finished wood. But I also had no problem with vinyl tile that just looked like vinyl tile, it wasn't pretending to be anything else.

I would never buy a knock off of a famous piece of furniture or a pirated clothing/accessories that were intended to deceive/ meant to look like the genuine article. If I could not afford or did not want to pay for the real thing I would pass.

I just can't get over how everyone embraced the faux stone ceramic slabs... even in $7 million+ homes here in L.A. New money buying theses homes don't know what quality is anymore.

I am willing to make just about anything look like faux metal with Rub N Buff, like my faux brass candlesticks made of white pvc on my chandelier. I use it because it is cheap, does not weigh as much as real metal, and is a fast fix. It also satisfies my DIY itch.

I have faux s-shaped Panton chairs in my dining room. I cannot afford real ones and I love the look.

Faux zebra rug in my laundry room.

Thank you, chispa. I did want to start what I thought or hoped might be an interesting discussion. It was a thought that came to me as I was reading that fireplace discussion and suddenly realized how faux has improved in home areas and wondering why I and others would choose it even if we can afford the real thing. Convenience is a factor but there might be other reasons like palimpsest and ilikefriday have pointed out.

For myself I chose white faux silk drapes because the sun quickly destroys real silk (and real silk won't come in pure white to start and even off-white silk yellows. With the exception of a grocery store orchid, real plants and flowers are off limits due to the cats' curiosity. The LVP flooring can handle the "thundering elephants" running of my cats without damage. My Christmas tree is faux because I cannot manage to get one home myself, stand it up, water it regularly (and keep the cats away from that water, which is dangerous for them), and risk their climbing the tree. We also no longer have a tree farm anywhere near me. Those are my reasons for my choices. I am truly interested in others' experiences and choices and their reasons for them. Sorry to disappoint you, Kilroy.

I would also use faux/artificial for anything endangered. So something printed with zebra or tiger or things like that could be kind of fun, but I would not want a real skin I don't think.

Many things that we now treat as "real" were originally faux-something. Like concrete or stucco standing in for stone. Ornamental plaster or composite bits on millwork in the 19th c. stood in for something carved. So I feel like if you want to use urethane crown molding to stand in for plaster, if they had something like that in the 19th c. they may not have been against using it.

I choose for the least environmental impact including whether something is going to pollute for generations in a landfill. When we all are choosing things for our own convenience but are polluting the earth, our children and grandchildren will suffer for our choices. No to LVP and natural gas. and fake trees.I recently used a small remnant of quartz and really regret that choice. More plastic.

Interesting discussion- i too could never have a real animal skin but have a leopard look rug in a bedroom i love. I am hoping to replace my wood burning FP with gas this year but i can only have real xmas trees 😅 it is funny what we each hang on to and what we can let go of for convenience, ease of use etc…

In England there is a place that sells you a Christmas tree with a root ball and replants it after the holidays. And you can use the same one year after year. I know Christmas trees are compostable but I think it's kinda wasteful to grow and cut down a tree for a few weeks use. And some people are so lazy they throw their trees away with the lights still on them because lights are cheap.

I think it's hard to sort out what the carbon footprint is of many things.

The grade school I went to was built in 1952. Except for the cafeteria, the entire building has the original vinyl floors that were installed in 1952. 70 years with no end in site is a long life cycle. Compare that with people who replace engineered floors because they think the color is unfashionable. It's wood but it's still full of chemicals and such and it's treated as it's semi-disposable. I think there is a lot that goes into this equation and it's not always obvious.

I have read about those root ball trees - so charming - I wish my small town had that option! here the boy scouts pick up your tree, mulch it and then sell the mulch to Parks & Rec for lanscaping but it still feels wasteful to me since it took years to grow the treee (although the xmas tree is nothing compared to when i worked in a grocery store and saw all of the meat & seafood thrown out every day)

Several years ago I had our wood-burning fireplace converted to gas, so that I could have a fire any time I wanted. After my DH passed away and my son no longer lived at home, it became clear that it now it was up to me to build a fire (and clean the fireplace) and that was just never going to happen.

"I choose for the least environmental impact." Said the poster using the internet which has a negative environmental impact. Virtue signaling is timeless; there's nothing faux about it.

I don't really understand that comment. Is trying to make environmental choices to the best of one's knowledge totally negated because the poster uses the internet? It's not very easy to not use the internet.

If you had evidence that the person touting their footprint was taking a private jet or helicopter everywhere I could see pointing it out. . .but the internet?

I have cats and real hardwood floors- its a perfect combination.

Uhoh, I suspect Jen K has LVP flooring, lots of natural gas, fake trees AND quartz. :P

We are all geological specs in time. The vast polluters of the planet are China and India. You think they're worrying about breaking down an Amazon box? Crushing the tp cardboard roll? Uhhhh no. They're in the business of creating prosperity for a population (combined ) of over 2.8 BILLION. We're roughly 350 million ( rising due to no particular BORDER.

REAL OR FAUX? There's a place for both. There is personal preference, allergies, convenience, up keep. You can think on that while you chomp on some "faux food" and don't tell me you eat none. You're not churning the butter, milking the cow at four am ......and your horse and buggy ...along with the ice man and milk man are long gone.

Life is messy, progress is as well. Contrary to a "certain someone's" belief? In twelve years we'll still be here ( or you hope you will ) . You may be without some convenience, as those who go right on with THEIR conveniences, tell you how to live.

Okay, that's it: ) and I'm all for gas fires. Gas grills, Gas ranges. And gas in my damn car too.

"Me thinks" your facts are not. As to trolls? I am anything but - but you dear sir, are POLITELY invited and entitled to believe as you like. Have a nice day.

Interesting concept -- when is a fake better /more practical /easier than "the real thing"?

- Ceramic tile in a marble-look is easier to keep clean and much more difficult to stain.

- Stainless steel flatware requires less upkeep than sterling flatware. I personally have two full sets of sterling that haven't seen the light of day in years. I do display my sterling tea /coffee set in one of my china cabinets.

- Fake ceiling beams look just as good as real wood (high up in the air) and are cheaper /easier to install.

- Similarly, MDR crown molding (assuming it's painted, not stained) is just as good as real wood, and -- again -- it's up over our heads, so no one ever gets a close-up look at it.

- I can't think of the name of it, but that fake-wood for decks. It doesn't need to be sealed over the years.

Pollution per country is hard to sort out because it depends on how you include it. Is it per capita, overall, etc. Safe to say many places overall are making bad choices. Lots of defeatist mentalities suggest we can’t make a difference as individuals it’s up to industry etc to make true change. But we all do what we can and that likely looks different to each of us. I think it’s great there are a variety of materials out there for people to choose from.

Interesting when people don't post their own preferences but instead attack others for their choices.

Thank you, Pal.

Is Olychick a faux name? Pal.

Olychick, I would just ignore these trolls. The site is lousy with them right now.

Here in Vancouver gas is being forcefully eliminated. No new home builds will have gas from what I understand. There are also tons of green initiatives related to building. Not sore how it impacts existing spaces. We do have gas and I must admit I appreciated it when our power went out for a big stretch.

If locales (in the US anyway) eliminate the use of gas in new construction, existing housing stock will have to be grandfathered. There are 2 million rental units in NYC alone, and the standard for most of the pre 21st century housing stock is gas for cooking. ( I don't know about newer construction, I've never been in an apartment built in the 21st c. there) Most of us will be long dead before residential gas is really Eliminated, because they are not going to wholesale convert or tear down the existing housing stock to do so.

Paul:

By all means let's "get it straight". We manufacture16.6% of the world's stuff, second only to China, however, we have some of the cleanest air. China does not.

It's unlikely it will be eliminated in the near future unless we run out (it IS a finite resource), but discouraging its use in new construction is a good move for the environment. Encouraging and developing alternative fuel sources will help, too.

Some property owners have gas on their properties and it would be pretty silly not to use it.

As far as a recent polluting event ... the destruction of Ukraine is right up there. How many wasted resources and pollution from all the destruction and then the amount of natural resources it will take to replace/rebuild it all. My first thought is with the lives lost, but also very depressing when you see all that destruction and waste. I don't hear any of the "green people" in their jets making any comments about that damage to the environment/resources.

It's a false dichotomy to say that China and India are the major polluters, as though that implies that the first world, who buys so much of their products and who has over-consumed for time out of mind has no responsibility. Every tonne of carbon is made up of individual grams. The ones we waste count just as much as anyone else's.

It doesn’t matter who’s on first, what matters is that without buy-in from all 3, nothing will improve.

But in will be irrelevant if there is no supply

Put us in the no-faux category: real wood, real stone, real plants, natural fibers. With exceptions, of course.

Even traditional wallpaper was originally faux hand painting.

Are things like Formica, which has lots of patterns that aren't imitative, faux?

What about Corian? Most patterns are not trying to imitate.

What about old fashioned VCT?

These are synthetic materials, more or less, but are they faux? They aren't pretending to be something found in nature.