Dedicated to critical cultural production at the intersection of art and activism.

We cover artists from around the globe whose work explores and realizes social change. Our goal is to provide a narrative about these activist efforts while simultaneously participating in them. Maintained by The Groundswell Collective since 2007.

101 Ways to Design Without Ruining the Earth

James David Morgan wrote this post at 11:39 am on July 25th, 2008.

This list, created by the School of Visual Concepts, Seattle, in cooperation with AIGA Seattle, Aquent, and Olympus Press, boasts slightly more than the claimed 101 Things Designers Can do to Save the Earth, weighing in at closer to 110.

I felt rather conflicted about posting the link, as the list recycles some options itself (reading Cradle to Cradle is mentioned at least twice) and has some obvious commercial intent (in the form of promotional spots in the list), but I decided it’d be a good chance to highlight some practices that make a direct and positive difference beyond the typical reduce, reuse, recycle habits, such as:

#71: Work locally

#40: Use low VOC-content inks

#17: Run a carbon-neutral design firm

#14: Use something besides vinyl for banners

#3: Make it smaller, lighter and from fewer materials

Related posts:

  1. HONK! Fest West 2009


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Discuss (2)

Thanks so much for spreading the word about our site. You’re right in that it has some duplicated content — this is one of the downsides of a volunteer, very part-time effort. But our heart is in the right place as we love it when designers act more responsibly towards the environment. Thanks again!

This is great. We need more artist/activists combos. People are really starting to care a lot more.