sustainable design

An Interview with a Corporate Green Hero

Bonnie Nixon, HP's corporate sustainability director, drives major change and serves as a leader for us all.READ»

The 11th Commandment: Sustainability, for a House of God

Students from the Illinois Institute of Technology complete a deceptively simple chapel, using cutting edge sustainable techniques.READ»

Good Intention and Rounding Errors: Occupational Hazards of Sustainable Design

An occupational hazard of working in sustainable design is the constant reminder that everything has impact. For everything in your field of view, materials and energy were wrestled from the ground and shipped around the earth in ...READ»

What Can The USA Learn From Iceland Regarding Clean Energy?

Yesterday (September 22), President Obama addressed the United Nations Climate Change Summit with a speech focused on how the United States is "determined" to combat Climate Change. While the Waxman-Markey bill has been held up in the ...READ»

Don't Peel Away Old Billboards. Turn Them Into Handbags

Furniture maker Artecnica has teamed up with TBWA/Chiat/Day to create accessories from the ad-industry's refuse.READ»

Companies Embrace Innovation Through Their Buildings

This morning, I attended a private tour of the new Eco Office at Southface Energy Institute in Atlanta, Georgia.   Southface is an organization who works in green building advancement.  Long before the USGBC began gaining ...READ»

Big Businesses Move Closer to Real Sustainable Innovation

This month seems to be the season for corporate gatherings, particularly in the sustainability world. Perhaps the “green” enthusiasts prefer to gather when the weather is warmer. Two weeks ago, I participated in the Sustainable ...READ»

Furniture That Records the Passing of a Day

Austrian designers create a machine registers the day's sunlight, and then automatically memorializes it in a fabric pattern.READ»

Ikea's Newest Furniture Line: Packed With Ideas

Ikea doesn't usually show at furniture fairs, but this year the Swedish home furnishings company made an exception at ICFF, to unveil a sprawling new line of ambitious designs. The so-called PS line is Ikea's flagship for ...READ»

How to Reduce Restaurant Waste and Cost by Over 50% AND Power a City

Last week I had the benefit of meeting the team that is revolutionizing the way restaurants will look at their waste.  The group is Fox Pollutions Systems from the UK and Germany and I met them in the corporate offices of Ted’s ...READ»

Four Wooden Bicycles That Will Grow on You

Maybe it's the craze for sustainable products, or just retro-hipsterism gone amok. But whatever the reason, wooden bikes are gaining in popularity. They're not rickety, jury-rigged jobs either. They're super-sleek, statement pieces. ...READ»

Leader in Corporate Sustainability Arena Comments on Wal-Mart's Position

Scott Seydel remarks on my recent post on Conscious Capitalism as it relates to Wal-Mart.READ»

iFive: GM and Chrysler to Get Bailed Out Again, Peter Chernin Meets Peter Griffin, and Amazon-Digg? in Today's Innovation News

While you were sleeping, innovation plotted its comeback. Here's today's innovation news: President Obama's auto task force appears ready to keep GM and Chrysler afloat with more bailout loans, pending concessions from ...READ»

Sustainable Design Group Tops 150,000 Members, Adds Forum to Share Ideas

What kind of cardboard is best for compostable packaging? What can we do to encourage consumers to recycle? What kind of testing does the FDA do for materials toxicity? How can I convince my clients that sustainable design can ...READ»

• Building a Sustainable Design Community
• The Impact of the Designers Accord Movement

Jack Welch, A Proponent of Conscious Capitalism?

Right now, denizens of young corporate leaders and entrepreneurs who are fighting the good fight –getting investors and their corporate leaders on board with new and more sustainable ways to view business – are perking up at the recent words from former GE Chairman and CEO, Jack Welch. If you have been reading my blog, you have followed my discussions of sustainability as a part of corporate consciousness for the past months. Today, I was pointed towards the latest word from Mr. Welch, publically stating that it was “a dumb idea” for executives to focus so heavily on quarterly profits and share price gains. Wait, wasn’t it Welch who originally created the “shareholder value movement” in the early 80s? READ»

Building Green Cities Online with Renewable Energy

Online games which teach us how to retool our world are extremely valuable in educationing ourselves and the next generation, but we must be mindful that the lessons are real.READ»

Free and Clean for All: Corporate Global Responsibility Issues of Water:

It’s our responsibility to take a stronger position with water that’s not just about water pollution (that position should be table stakes to any corporation in business in the world today), but more about ready and available sources. It’s about a desire to reduce our TAKE from the total supply; our responsibility to not draw water from sources which cannot be replenished or taken from communities who have no other source of clean available water and turn around and sell it back to them. READ»

Mallrats Lit Up By Solar Energy in California

The Shops at Mission Viejo in Mission Viejo,CA is getting a green makeover with the largest solar installation in a U.S. shopping mall. The 173 kilowatt. 20,000 sq. foot system was installed by Element Markets, LLC--the country's ...READ»

New Shades of Green: Adapting to Our Partner's Green Goals

As I reach out to my partners in the world of corporate sustainability directors, we are all asking how we can provide our corporations with truly ROI-driven sustainable programs. And, how can we bring these projects to our companies in a timely manner to yield immediate returns in the form of corporate profits. READ»

Mother Nature Network: Online Media Finally Catches up to Sustainability Needs

January launched many new beginnings for our country. One I want to highlight today is the launch of the Mother Nature Network(www.mnn.com), a website created by marketing guru and veteran Joel Babbit, and tree farmer and music industry legend Chuck Leavell (keyboardist for the Rolling Stones). READ»

Can a New Administration Spur Innovation in Design?

Regardless of political leanings, for most of us, we agree that this has undoubtedly been a significant week in history.  I have contemplated all week about how I could speak about this momentous transition and not just be one more ...READ»

Making Green Simple: Collaborations and Partnerships

From a high-level perspective, partnerships become more sustainable for corporations when the very nature of collaboration is mutually beneficial. No one company has to re-invent the wheel and can also leverage dollars across multiple ...READ»

Sharing Green Practices Among Industry Leaders will Advance Corporations

How do we make the world work for 100 percent of humanity in the shortest possible time through spontaneous cooperation without ecological damage or disadvantage to anyone?  This is a question Buckminster Fuller posed to the world in ...READ»

Call to Action for Sustainabilty Leadership in Tough Economic Climate

Last week I had the benefit of spending two and a half days with roughly 150 other “green” marketers, sustainability officers and other champions of our environmental movement. The event, called Good and Green, was organized by ...READ»

A Sustainable Brand Identity

So, what is a sustainable brand identity? Let's start by defining a Brand Identity. Fundamentally, your brand identity is the visual interpretation of your cause, business, or products. It is the way in which we recognize and ...READ»