Using Design for Good

Everything has been tinged a little green these days, including design. There is plenty of information about it how to do it, plenty of books written about why, and plenty of talks and discussions by people who are practicing it. Clients are now demanding it, paper companies have created more sustainable product lines in response to it, and some design firms are specialising in it. In the past, greener design was seen as an expensive extra, but these days there are examples where it can make good economic sense. There are also options at all levels of the design process where more sustainable choices can be made.

Practivism 2008

Last year I attended GDCBC’s first Practivism event where three speakers discussed their experiences with practical activism in relation to green design within their design practice. It was an enlightening and encouraging evening. I came away with a new way of looking at design and a commitment to making better design choices. I was especially impressed by Brian Dougherty of Celery Design and the studio’s concept of designing backwards. I immediately read his (and celery design’s) book Green Graphic Design cover to cover and put what I read into practice on the first project at hand – the MOV Studio design. It was an enlightening ride through a forest of supposedly sustainable options. I don’t think I would have been able to make proper sense of things without the book as a guide. I found that while there are a lot of new sustainable options when it comes to printing substrates, not all are what they seem. Recycled vinyl is still vinyl. Its final resting place is still the landfill – for a very, very long time. And for some materials there are no, as of yet, good solutions. As designers we have to be savvy when it comes to labeling. Design isn’t just about graphic design any more – design is the whole process. Including the part we don’t think we’re part of – the beginning and end of the materials we are utilising.

Practivism 2009

This brings me to the whole point of this post. Practivism is back for a second year. This time the focus is on social sustainability. Environmental sustainability has been a buzzword for some time. I’m pretty sure, when asked, most people could tell you what it is and give an example of a environmentally sustainable initiative. But what about social sustainability? And what is our role as designers in that?

The speaker line-up is impressive: Andréa Pellegrino (Worldstudio), Nathan Shedroff (Design is the Problem), and Kara Pecknol (IDEO Human Centered Design Toolkit) and the location this year is the Museum of Vancouver, a fitting place to begin a discussion about what design’s role in social change can and has been.

Join the discussion on November 19, 2009.  The itinerary is as follows:

Cash bar/ snacks/ MOV exhibit tours: 5:30pm – 7:00pm
Speakers/ Dialogue: 7:00-9:00pm
Reception: 9:00-10:30pm

Full event, speaker and ticketing details on the Practivism website.

Sketchbook ~ Pearl

pencil

Ravishing Beasts Opening Party

Ravishing Beasts opens at the Museum of Vancouver on October 22, 2009. The opening party is on October 21, 2009 at 7pm. Tickets are available on the MOV website (members are free!).

There’s more information about Ravishing Beasts on the MOV blog.

Sketchbook ~ Fox

Fox | ink + digital

I’m starting to experiment a little with approaches to colour for the book I’m working on. I’m neck deep in working the drawings out still so I haven’t allowed myself to fully delve into playing with ink and paint yet. But this was a quick little 15 minute thing I whipped up this morning. After labouring over getting drawings right, it’s nice to just ignore that aspect completely and just play with an idea.

The Canadian Design Resource Blog

Thank you to the kind folks at The Canadian Design Resource blog who recently blogged one of the illustrations I created for lululemon athletica last year.

The CDR has become one of my favourite blogs recently as it showcases such a range of all types of Canadian design and illustration both contemporary (and quirky) and delightfully retro. There are hay balers and overpasses, trivets, beer packaging, Newfoundland dogs and everything in between.

The canning jars are a particular favourite of mine since my boyfriend and I made our first foray into canning by making refrigerator pickles in his grandmother’s old made-in-Canada glass-lidded canning jars:

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While on the subject of Canadiana, I have to sneak this stamp design in:

Sad

Back when I was a graphic design and illustration student, the illustrators in my class were almost unanimously united in worship of the paintings of Bernie Fuchs. A class trip to New York found a group of us sitting on the floor of the Illustration House Gallery with our noses mere inches from his original paintings that had been kindly brought out from the storage room and propped around the floor for us.

Upon purchasing a collections of posters at another illustration institution there, I found they had been rolled up and packaged for me in a mailing tube that had previously housed one of Mr. Fuchs paintings. His name and studio address were still affixed to the tube.

Bernie Fuchs died last night.

New work ~ MOV Studio Design

There was a mummy and a bicycle, a cougar and a beaver, as well as an (abridged) time-line of the history of Vancouver and the world. The floor was concrete so the acoustics were awful. The space was cluttered, confusing pathing and overwhelming the room – were the exhibits to the left or right? The Orientation Gallery at the Vancouver Museum needed a redesign; the Vancouver Museum was becoming the Museum of Vancouver. The brand was new and ready to be launched, the museum’s direction had been redefined and great new exhibitions were planned for the future (Velo-City was opening soon). The Orientation Gallery was soon to undergo a change of name and floor covering.

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New Work ~ Rachael Ashe logo & business card

Vancouver photographer Rachael Ashe recently asked me to design her business cards. As part of the project I also created a logo for her that reflects her interest in and use of birds in her photography and collage work. The logo has also been adapted for use on stickers, stamps and labels to further brand her artwork.

This new design work has been added to my online portfolio under the title Rachael Ashe identity and business card.