The IDSA provides a suite of readings on ecodesign, including this 2003 survey on the ecological performance of electronic products (pdf), in which a survey of product designers sought to reveal the mechanisms for indluencing sustainable design in consumer electronics. This bar chart struck my eye because it represents exactly what needs to change in […]
Category Archives: energy
designers = form-givers
Also posted in environment, fabrication, marketing, materials, possessed products, product design, supply chain
Comments closed
farm map
We all know that eating local is not only more efficient, but also more delicious – unfortunately it can be hard to find the variety of foods we eat without resorting to a large supermarket. LocalHarvest is a web resource for finding local farms and farmers markets, including a map of all the farms and […]
Also posted in blogogracy, conviviality, environment, food
Comments closed
sustainable prayers
Deva Seetharam reminded me of an old project and we started talking about how prayer wheels could be appropriated for new purposes. Traditional prayer wheels are cylinders containing written mantras that are spun to recite the wishes within. They can be spun by hand, but some traditional prayer wheels are designed to be spun by […]
Also posted in environment, futurecraft, product design
Comments closed
public objects
‘Products of Service‘ are an alternative to cradle-to-grave life cycles where consumers only temporarily rent goods from manufacturers so that their valuable components can be directly re-used. In lieu of such enlightened manufacturing practices, a social network has been introduced where anyone can rent out their own possessions to reduce waste: Zilok is a Zipcar […]
Also posted in conviviality, environment, futurecraft, marketing, open objects, product design, retail, supply chain, traceability
Comments closed
phone-maker
The brilliant Schulze & Webb have done it again with the Metal Phone, a completely recyclable cell phone enclosure developed for Nokia. The project is a complete cradle-to-cradle life cycle process: a cell phone encased in a lead alloy (ok, solder) can be disassembled and melted down to be re-cast into a new cell phone […]
Also posted in customization, environment, fabrication, futurecraft, materials, open objects, product design, supply chain, upcycling
Comments closed
busting out
The hundreds of millions of electronics thrown out each year are depleting precious resources and creating vast deposits of toxic materials, most of which are difficult or impossible to isolate almost by design. Active Disassembly is a promising technique for recycling electronics that relies on shape-memory connectors inside devices to pop apart under heat, separating […]
Also posted in environment, fabrication, futurecraft, materials, open objects, product design, supply chain
Comments closed
homeless polluters
Despite the plethora of personal footprint calculators out there, I have always had the nagging feeling that personal choices make almost no difference on the environment – that the shift of responsibility for environmental woes to individuals is a corporate strategy meant to reduce pressure on producers and legislators to regulate radical improvements to industrial […]
Also posted in conviviality, environment
Comments closed
mesh and re-mesh
A the Lexus installation at the Salone del Mobile there was an interesting installation about generation of mesh structures which provided hints for their eventual re-generation and re-use. The chair above was manufactured using a 3D printer from 2kg of fused Nylon powder. As part of the exhibition a series of models depicted how the […]
Also posted in customization, environment, fabrication, furniture, futurecraft, materials, product design, soft/glowing, upcycling
Comments closed