Day 6 of the NPD course was delivered by Michael Gutierrez PERA/Supply London. He was focusing on the legislation and liability that comes with being a manufacturer/designer/distributor. I am beginning to realise from this and the previous intellectual property modules, that design is as much about having a good lawyer as it is about innovation. Saying that, the key to getting the best bang-for-your-buck from your legal assets seems to be using them early in your development process. If you can afford legal cover/advice at the front-end it can save you a lot of money if things turn to custard. This is what lawyers like to call “risk-management”, because legalities are going to get your money at some point. It is best to give the beast a sacrifice rather than taking a chance with it eating you alive.

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This lecture was only one of the many fruitful outcomes of the invaluable time I spent with Pli earlier this year. It is about the ‘Utility Scheme‘ — legislation that put design, manufacturing and trade of certain products under the strict control of the British government during and just after World War II. (You may click here to read Christopher’s review of this lecture).

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It was exactly a week ago today that I was trying to make a point at London Remade’s Green and Thrifty seminar, about a political-economic pendulum swinging back and forth between two polar opposites: “A no-holds-barred free market; and total state intervention”.

Trying to derive a lesson from the Utility Scheme, one of my main arguements was that no matter how benign the intentions of an authoritarian action are, history shows us that the public never fully abides by what has been put forward as mandatory. It is very interesting to see that this argument can in fact strike a chord in today’s current affairs.

A recent piece of news talks about a decision by the German civic authorities to make solar panels mandatory in the town of Marburg. This legislation sets a rule for “every new house or those whose roofs or heating systems are being renovated to install solar panels”.

Looks like killing two birds with one stone: Battling climate change and surviving at a time when energy prices are soaring. Nothing wrong up to this point? Don’t be so quick to judge.

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I truly adore reading leftover material, and my latest experience was even more pleasurable for being about green issues. Taking a look at an abandoned April 12th issue of The Times, I learned about Bill Bryson’s launch of a three year campaign against street littering. Take a look at this article to see how serious his commitment to “Keep Britain Tidy” is.

“London is now the dirtiest city in Europe as well as the costliest.” Now, that is some paradox.

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Here’s a link to Home-air-purifier-expert.com, a site which goes some way towards explaining the reason why Pli adds no formaldehyde to any of our products, in glues, binders, fillers, coatings or paints… (via Treehugger). Exposure times to industrial emissions of formaldehyde are limited by law. Prolonged exposure even to small quantities of formaldehyde is thought to cause health problems.

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I’m interested in the Eden Project’s Waste Neutral initiative, which has formed the basis of the giant Cornish greenhouse and education centre’s waste and procurement strategy over the last couple of years. In fact the conferences and discussions we have attended at Eden have inspired us at Pli to think more systematically about how we can help ourselves and our customers, to balance the waste we produce with the waste we might be able to reuse.

It’s a tricky issue: there are so many sources of waste and it all goes off in different directions for disposal. Just about the only point where it could all come together to be quantified and evaluated is in our own home - hardly the ideal place. Sometimes my own kitchen feels like it’s overflowing with all the waste I’m carefully separating as I go, often to cram a lot of it back together in a big blue plastic box for Southwark Council to take away. I could hardly say I’m on top of it all.

So I was fascinated to learn in Time Magazine about RecycleBank - a pleasing example of some entrepreneurial person putting himself in my shoes and working out what he can do to help me out.

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Water conservation is a hot topic at the moment, right up there with carbon footprints and organic food. How much am I using? What part of my day uses the most water? Most of us could only roughly guess the answers to these questions. If you would like to get a handle on your consumption - and know more about what water goes where - have a play on this water calculator from Zerofootprint.net (via Treehugger).

It is interesting to see what effects your water consumption the most: just shaving a minute of your showers can save around 3000L of water in a year. However, if you just can’t give up your shower time, try finding the extra savings somewhere else in your water footprint. For example you can install one of these Australian ‘Quench’ showers (also via treehugger) which lets you you recycle your shower water for long, guilt free showers (excuse the semi nudity and accents).

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For a while now, we’ve been using some research from WRAP (the UK Government’s Waste & Resources Action Programme) to compare the weight of our furniture with average weights for different UK furniture categories. It’s part of a project we are running to reduce weight in all our products as we update our designs.

The data we’re using comes from the appendix of the Household Waste Prevention Toolkit, which is a handy document aimed at local authorities. The toolkit (which is a PDF document) contains practical action points and supporting statistics. It’s very detailed and it could help to inform your thinking on domestic or community waste reduction… (click on the image)

The idea of Cradle to Cradle design has been around for a while now, see article Cradle to Cradle is 6. Since 2002, the ground breaking work by William McDonough and Dr. Michael Braungart has made a a huge impact on the materials industry. Material ConneXion, one of the biggest material databases in the world has recently begun collaborating with MBDC and EPEA to create the first Cradle to Cradle materials library.

A GLOBAL PLATFORM FOR CRADLE TO CRADLE DESIGN

Given today’s demands for more socially and environmentally conscious products and materials, it is important for companies to positively define their global impact and be leaders in environmental performance. Recognizing the value of each other’s expertise, Material ConneXion, MBDC and EPEA have joined forces to create the leading global platform for developing innovative, sustainable and Cradle to Cradle materials and products.
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Making smart decisions about which electronic appliances to use will make a big difference to how planet-saving your home is. One of the bigger breakthroughs in power saving electronics over the past decade is the LCD TV. Along with the benefits of its larger picture and slim-line design, they use 3 times less energy than an equivalent size CRT TV, while using a third less energy than Plasma TVs.

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April 2002 saw the arrival of one of those rare books that stays interesting and relevant long after its publication. It seemed to have an instant impact on the small world of sustainable design. But looking back it’s better described as a slow-burner: its impact is still apparent as the issues it discussed are shouldered by a growing community of designers.

I bought my copy of Cradle to Cradle a year later, in April 2003. It’s been a touchstone ever since: at Pli, terms like ‘downcycling’ and ‘nutrients’ still permeate our discussions.

Here’s a question for you: if you have read Cradle to Cradle, what have you done that you can say is a direct result of the ideas you came across in its rather heavy plastic pages?

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The breaking news were delivered by German weekly newspaper Die Zeit: Philippe Starck is “fed up with his job and plans to retire in two years”. The renowned designer went on further to claim that “design is dead and his work ‘unnecessary’”.

Well, there are people who hate the French designer and others who adore him, as is the case with star names in any business. Some of those tree huggers out there might even be celebrating. Blogs are filled with outraged people arguing that they will not accept Starck’s confession, for he has done so much damage and made so much money out of it. I will approach this piece of breaking news from another angle. Read more »