Our book selection on sustainability issues:

A classic lecture, a well structured and visual book covering sustainable furniture, technology (…), and an informative book on sustainable fibers and new approaches to sustainable fashion.

Clèries Reports_books-sustainability I_b

1 / Viktor Papanek; ‘Design for the real world: Human ecology and social change’, Thames & Hudson, 1st edition 1985. Reprint 2009. Link to book.

Victor Papanek’s lively and instructive guide shows how design can reduce pollution, overcrowding, starvation, obsolescence and other modern ills. He leads us away from ‘fetish objects for a wasteful society’ towards a new age of morally and environmentally responsible design.

2 / Dalcacio Reis, Julius Wiedemann; ‘Product design in the sustainable era’. Published by Taschen, 2010. Link to book.

Featuring reusable products from water bottles and diapers to solar- and wind-powered goods; clocks that run by reacting with soil; air and water purifiers; coffins and urns for sustainable funerals; paper made from elephant and sheep dung—as well as eco-friendly chocolates, bikinis, guitars, energy efficient appliances and much more—this is a state-of-the-art update on the sustainable revolution in product design.

3 / Kate Fletcher, Lynda Grose; ‘Fashion & Sustainability: Design for Change’. Published by Laurence King, 2012. Link to book.

This book examines how sustainability has the potential to transform both the fashion system and the innovators who work within it. Sustainability is arguably the defining theme of the twenty-first century. The issues in fashion are broad-ranging and include labour abuses, toxic chemicals use and conspicuous consumption, giving rise to an undeniable tension between fashion and sustainability. The book is organized in three parts. The first part is concerned with transforming fashion products across the garment’s lifecycle and includes innovation in materials, manufacture, distribution, use and re-use. The second part looks at ideas that are transforming the fashion system at root into something more sustainable, including new business models that reduce material throughput. The third section is concerned with transforming the role of fashion designers and looks to examples where the designer changes from a stylist or creator into a communicator, activist or facilitator.