Years ago I attended a panel discusson on green living at Cooper Union. As one professor after another extolled the virtues of solar power, renewable resources, environmental responsibility and the like, the students around me nodded rapturously, and everyone on the panel remained unchallenged.

I then realized that there's little merit in preaching to the congregation; everyone at that lecture was already on-board with these ideas, and the movement gained no new members that day. The green revolution would not start by only enlisting city-dwelling, college-educated students; the revolution would begin when blue-collar folk from the hinterlands purchased and used greener variants of the things they needed and wanted.

Well, that revolution may now be underway, with this rather surprising announcement: The La-Z-Boy chair, that American icon of sedentary leisure time, has just been awared an Innovative Green Design Award, which honors "home product designs that offer consumers the greenest materials, most sustainable methods of manufacturing, highest energy efficiencies, greatest innovations and minimal carbon footprints."

The La-Z-Boy "EcoComfort" line of chairs features soy-based foam cushions, fabric made from sustainable materials, and renewable rubber wood arms. It ain't the prettiest thing to look at, but considering the sheer amount of these chairs that will be produced and sold, well, sometimes this is how you make a difference.