Click for more info at AIGAPortland.org

I love design. With that comes a love of making things and imagining things as they could be. As we all know though, we don’t just create from nothingness; an input is required for an output. When the concern for available resources and waste becomes real, what role do designers have to integrate sustainable practices into what they create?

This is certainly a hefty issue for designers since the ball is kind of in their court to integrate the solutions; hardly anything we come in contact with these days is not designed. Even the trees outside the window that I see right now were probably placed there under the guidance of a landscape architect.

Some solutions are as simple as addressing needs with the waste from another process thereby making use of typically discarded resources while solving a problem. I recall reading about a pair of students who designed a packaging for light bulbs which could be converted into a lampshade to be sold in Chile where lightbulbs are typically bare. An amazingly simple example of cutting waste with a little bit of thought and a broad look at the needs of an area.

I’m excited to hear more discussion regarding this topic in such an amazing place for sustainable design such as Portland. This is just my little blurb/giddy excitement for a later post discussing (I’m assuming) how spectacular AIGA Portland’s SHIFT: A Green Salon is/was… free beer with if you bring your own mug too so, the cards are definitely favorable.

Oh, how I love Portland.

Check out more info regarding the event at AIGAPortland.org and be sure to come back for my recap of the event!