The Sustainable Design working group meets this December to discuss a wide range of topics and get a talk from Anna Karin Jönbrink. She will talk about the EuP European directive.
The group's focus now moves more toward action and we hope to be able to report back with some progress in the new year. In the meantime, heres the agenda for discussion.
9am Updates and news from the group SMF funding for sustainable business- http://www.mfe.govt.nz/publications/about/guide-smf-applicants-2009-oct08/smf-guidance-applicants-2009.pdf Overview of SDWG Plan
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Through Tom and Giancarlo at the Frog office I was able to meet with Ezio Manzini. Manzini is someone who I have long admired. I have an original hardback copy of ‘The Material of Invention’ authored by him in 1986 that I purchased from a second hand bookstore in Seattle.
Manzini is now also acknowledged as an expert in the area of sustainable product design. Manzini has the distinction of being one of the more interesting designers and thinkers of his generation (a level above anything featured in the Italian design museum).
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I was befriended in my 3rd year at school by a small group of Final Year Industrial Designers. Two of these are of note; Adam Ellis who merges the landscape with product design and his knowledge of plants, and Thomas Sutton, who applied his calculator style intellect to product design. The differentiating factor with these two designers over the others in their year (which was the best year of ID in NZ I have seen) was that they designed for a reason.
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Whilst in London I visited Jared Mankelow. Jared and I go quite far back, as a 17 year old he was working as a cabinet maker, he was always interested and hanging around the design studio.
Eventually I suggested design school and there has not been alot in his way since. He went on to graduate from Industrial design amongst the top in his class; he worked for Locus Research for a while and then headed to IDEO for an internship with a friend of mine Jo Oliver.
I visited the office of Onzo on the 6th and 7th of November to catch up with Neil Tierney and to see what their team is doing. The new offices of Onzo are located in the West End in London. On Great Newport street.
We have known the guys in Scotland at Lightweight Medical and Element06 (one in the same) since they visited New Zealand 4-5 years ago. Since that time Ryder Meggitt worked at our old studio in Grey Street along with Neil Tierney and Blythe Rees-Jones has travelled to the UK and subsequently worked with them for 9 months in Glasgow and London.
As part of the Irish Design Week, Reform 08 is held to reinforce the inclusion of sustainability into design practice.
The event is largely created through the energy of two people; Adam de Eyto (Carlow Institute of Technology), and Muireann McMahon (Limerick University). Their efforts are an attempt to build the level of sustainable design in Ireland.
During the first part of my European Trip I was hosted by Muireann McMahon a lecturer at the University of Limerick in product design. Product design is part of the Manufacturing and Operations Engineering faculty. Ryder Meggit from Element06 and Onzo came along for the session before the Reform08 Conference.
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This year’s CEO Summit set out to explore how New Zealand companies can make the most of sustainable design and business opportunities with examples given by several leading international organizations and a group of local companies committed to sustainability.
For a full outline of the Better By Design Conference please visit www.betterbydesign.org.nz
Key presentations were give by:
If I needed to summarise my comments with one sentence I’d say “Cradle to Cradle is great but not a panacea”.
The below is a limited analysis of “why”, only for those who have some time to kill through reading some of my rantings. I am critical, sceptical and talk (write?) too much by default due to being a PhD student. I really do think Cradle to Cradle is great. But not a panacea!
In do feel myself lucky as well since I had the chance to listen to Prof. Braungart’s presentation on cradle to cradle design.
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