I absolutely love this little animation.

La Chaussettologie - Challenge your world from Desrumaux Celine on Vimeo.

This is essentially where the problem lies. SOCKS!

Answer - get yourself an odd sock bag, and start being one of those hip mixin matchin hip kids.

The rise of climate change art!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2009/dec/02/climate-change-art-earth-rethink

The good old Guardian. Have a read.

How cute.

More cuteness less fact. We all know that people turn off when it comes to the possibility of being loaded up on fact and stats, esp when concerning the perilous state of the environment. There is just too much to know and not enough room in the frontal lobe to store it. It also adds to ones environmental lethargy - ie how the fuck can little me possibly do anything to combat 'THAT'... The best way for us designers / artists / humans to keep issue at the front of everyone's mind is with emotion. Hard effective emotive messaging. Well soft is this case. Love it.

pee in the shower and save the amazon..... awesome.

This is a lovely little animation about how to save 4,380 liters (1,157 gallons) of water annually per household. All you have to do is pee in the shower!



Made by the a 23 year old Brazilian non-profit private organization called SOS Mata Atlantica, which works for the protection of the Atlantic Forest. The website around the campaign is beautiful as well. Though you made need a little bit of Portugese to understand it. http://www.xixinobanho.org.br/

Where is all the goodness going?

The trouble with having a green thumb, is not that you are forever in constant battle with yourself about your everyday actions and how they affect the planet, but more avoiding being labelled as the socially killjoy. Being a designer with a green tint merely increases the struggle whilst also allowing for calls of hypocrite amongst those seeking a rise. Its not that we aren't hedonists, being a designer is evidence of this, its just that in we wish to see the good times to be had by all for generations to come.

The below graphic (click to see the full image) is fantastic for not only is it beautiful graphic design but it offers concise communication as to how much of the precious resources we have and how long they will last if we are to continue consuming without question. With images such as this how can one continue to call ignorance as an excuse for blissful naivety.

The problem with design....

Dont get me wrong, design is awesome. My issue lies with the continual human waste that it adds too. Not directly the problem of designers, but more the lack of legislation determining waste production world wide. While the powers that be procrastinate in efforts to make serious efforts to abate this problem, it is us, the understanding, intuitive and intellectual designer that needs to take charge of our profession to help make for serious change.


























http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/gallery/2009/jun/05/waste-world-environment-day?picture=348339024

Does switching to sustainability work in marketing.?

Absolutely. Well, with me anyway. Sony Ericsson have just announced plands to unveil two green handsets. Does that mean I will swap phones? No, but as soon as my current Nokia phone decides that it has had enough, I will look at making the switch. Hopefully by then, all phones everywhere will have a far more impressive carbon footprint than the current jump proposed below. Its a nice start Sony Ericsson, but only a start. Fingers crossed the environmentally sustainable aspect will become a competively fought in all markets.

Guardian Extract
Mobile phone company Sony Ericsson will unveil two "green" handsets tomorrow with a carbon footprint 15% lower than current models. By cutting packaging, using recycled plastics and reducing the use of solvents in the paints, the electronics company claims to have made the handsets more environmentally friendly.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/jun/04/mobile-phones-sony-ericsson

guardian.co.uk, Thursday 4 June 2009 16.46 BST
Alok Jha, green technology correspondent

With the world in dire need of serious change, you wouln't think that it be left to a chip (crisp for the brits) company to be leading the way. But Sun Chips have done just this. Addressing the need for a smarter packaging, they plan to introduce a fully biodegradable packet within the next year. It certainly helps to combat one aspect of this guilty pleasure of mine.

This is simply a lovely little clip. There website is cool too. http://www.sunchips.com

I will be writing more on the elepant in the studio, in regards to packaging design and the environment in weeks to come.

Give a Hand to wildlife

I have to keep giving it to the wwf for outstanding creative. Sure its not them creating but its them with the courage to sign off genious creative.

Advertising Agency: Saatchi&Saatchi Simko, Geneva, Switzerland
Creative Director: Olivier Girard
Art Director: Nicolas Poulain
Copywriter: Jean-Michel Larsen
Body painter: Guido Daniele

This is bloody fantastic....

http://good50x70.org

A truly remarkable site that called for submissions on a range of issues facing society. Always brings a tear to my eye to see graphic design actually being used for the forces of good, ie social change instead of consumerism. Here are a few of my favourite Global Warming posters....






Extinction
Habib Farajabadi
of Iran







CLIMATE CHANGES
Hector Ivan Dominguez Pino
Mexico





plus is the new minus
Corbineau Antoine
Mogarra Laurie
France






The Consequences of CO2 Emissions
Joe Scorsone
Alice Drueding
United States #






Our Time Is Running Out
Scott Laserow
United States #

Start a movement.... Change the world!

This is a brilliant talk. Highly recommended for any individual looking to embrace their egalitarian spirit but feel overwhelmed by the shear scale of their challenge. GO GET EM!!

HRH talking at the Royal Institute of British Architects.

This is surprisingly very interesting. Charles discusses the legacy of the Modernist experiment and its impact on society through its preoccupation with the mechanic. In doing so he touches on sustainabilty, holistic thinking and organic architecture. I am impressed (when will that damn Queen abdicate).

feminismiminnin nin and the material

Writing this stuff can be tough. Knocking it together it in three days, ridiculous.

Its a little doomsday... enjoy.

Consumerism is completely ubiquitous from which there is no escape. A cycle where the more we continue consume the more it becomes an increasingly integral part of our lives, ultimately defining our reality. It is here that it has become a problem, where we are faced with an impending catastrophe as the worlds insatiable hunger is met with another reality, global warming, loss of biodiversity and ultimately civilisation collapse. There are many reasons that could be identified for continual expedential increase in consumption, but no more so than that of the new globalised paradigm of super materialism. The end product of 'Man' and his eternal drive for success, but also his adorning female, who's attainment he strived so vigorously for. It is she that in the last half century through new found independence has been elevated to not just an equal partner as man, but an increased influence in the idea of material fulfilment within society as a whole.


Feminist theory takes on many forms and has been a fiercely debated platform for discussion from both sides of the political fence since its inception, but essentially it is the increased participation of women and how she has become a determined more equal entity within what has been traditionally a patriarchal dominated society. There have been many waves of feminism. The first dating back to industrialisation where workers sought to increase wage levels and rights of factory workers which culminated in the right to vote. The contemporary notion has its origins post WW2, where the powers that were looked to relieve a broken economy and the new threat of feverishly advancing state regimentation called Communism with a new consumer based society. Where even Clergy men were called to participate in calling on the masses to 'buy buy buy' in order to strengthen the economic model in the national interest. The result was an economic boom. Some theorists argue feminism was used as a way to promote the mobilization of more consumers, however it can be just as equally seen to be a naturally occurring component of newly created free market.


Equal opportunity within the workforce combined with the advent of new post war technologies create allowed for a devaluing in the role of womens work at home, and increased the need for greater interaction within society at large. Leaving the kitchen I en mass, women were infused into the patriarchal production machine presented before them, seeking success that had been previously only on offer to their opposite sex. Where once their consumer behaviour was tied to the salary of men, either father or husband, now it was of their own volition. These new surpluses were in addition to the existing family income, which they many women already presided over. Industry quickly jumped, creating many products based around the needs for the modern women. Preying on the insecure needs of women by defining new pathways for self-actualisation through material possession, the mass market, advertisers, marketeers and the like, with men still firmly at the helm, constructed some essential ideals of femininity. Simply, women compensated for years of political and economic oppression through the only socially acceptable form of self actualisation being promoted; material consumption.


Women might not have achieved the vast politcal power that feminism was aiming for, but certainly have achieved more spending power. The average women consumes twice as much as they did 50 years ago. If ownership is a sign of dependence, feminism will not discount that women have reached a relative equality. In fact, women have gone further beyond equal participation but a principle driver of the consumer world. Their primal instincts of gatherer are better served by the system than that of the hunter. Historically more vunerable, materialism acts to self medicate emotional and self esteem issues. Though acknowledge must be paid to system established where self concern is desirable. Where the 7billion dollars spent on beauty products in the UK last year is seen as something to be bettered the next. Snowballing from the individual freedoms of women replacing oppression into selfishness replacing altruism. More desire, more needs to be met, more me.


Men here do not escape blame for after all the free market system was of their creation. They are intrinsically linked to this process. While maintaining the existing dominant ethos of hunter supplier, they have had to evolve to aspire to the new demands of the feminine influenced consumer world. Actively participating in the new belief system just as the hegemonic discourse prescribes masculinity to be. In this sense traditional male constructs are being challenged by the need to feminise through materialism though probably still of perceived manly items. Young men could be considered equal gatherers to their cohorts of 50years ago – they like to shop and they equally appreciate material possession. Perhaps helped by the correlation between feminism and the advent of plastics since Post World war two which has caused humans excessive exposure to estrogen, lower sperm counts and the feminization of men. WTF.


Men and women have come to share the same tribal psychology that surrounds consumerism; we seek to emulate those above us on the social hierarchy, not just through fashion but food, fitness, sport and most importantly lifestyle. It is the adornment of everything that denotes success and dejection of people who do not aspire to take part. We are defined by what we possess. Even those on the cusp, and choose to reject the system, such as artists, take subversive roles.#


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