I had an opportunity to talk with Ina, one of the founders of M641, and learned more about the designs, the philosophy and the friendship that foster feel good fashions and plaid with a pulse.

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But this week, Vancouver turns the spotlight on sustainability with its first ever eco-focused fashion night, Friday, November 7th, 2008.

Vancouver Fashion Week, a hotbed of haute couture and leading west coast designers, is one of the premier purveyors of popular pageantry, unveiling some of the world’s most sought after styles and trends.  This year, VFW is showing its support for the environment with a dedicated evening for designers to promote their leading edge sustainable artistry and eco-conscious craftmanship.  From eco luxury, showcasing the art of organic handmade silk, to the unique beauty of recycled fabrics like cashmere and wool, an impressive range of techniques and designs will be featured.

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Natives replant palm trees for their seeds instead of logging them, which saves a bit of the rain forests. They polish the shell of the seeds and typically carve them into the shape of a button, living creature, or beautiful jewelry. Just think: an object much like a gem with all the qualities of ivory, but without harming wildlife.

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In my first report on Green Design Dialogues, I introduced the six participants of our May 25 discussion on green design and summarized a bit of what we talked about. Obviously, sustainability and design is a huge topic, and one these green designers love to talk about, so here is a continuation of our first Green Design Dialogue.

The energy of our conversation was rising as we discussed changes in the design industry. It is clear that designers are slowly beginning a journey towards a more sustainable way of working. Eric K said, "We're crawling, but it may be a little messy before we really work things out." Sustainability really offers a great opportunity for the design industry, and we all agreed that it's taking hold and will be very important to design in the future.

The paper industry is one example of a growing consciousness of green practices. Paper companies are big contributors to pollution and greenhouse gases, and they're slowly realizing it. There are now many sustainable paper options designers need to be aware of as greener papers evolve. Paper distributors, printers, and ultimately, designers, are all starting to pay attention to the chain of custody and all the effects of their paper choices. Of course, many of us agreed that part of the challenge of green design was moving beyond paper.

Eric K said, "The paper issue is a key one, but I keep asking how we can move past that paradigm as the key method of communication. There are more intelligent ways of reaching our audiences…. We've been saying 'solutions, not stuff.'" Graphic designers do tend to be stuck in the realm of the printed page. Reducing our dependence on paper and expanding our offerings to include other media are certainly great ways to design more sustainably. But, as Dani mentioned, there is still a need for print. Printed pieces do have a role to play in design and communication, but design as a strategy and process can be applied much more broadly than to just brochures, packaging, and magazines.

Some designers feel a bit threatened by this talk of moving beyond paper and print and making something intangible. It probably scares a lot of printers as well! As Bryn puts it, "for years, design has been all about the artifact, not the thinking." This is slowly changing as we begin to place more value in the intangible (think mp3s or other digital media).

Efficiency and choosing the right media and materials for the message are a large part of green design. Another important aspect is the idea of simplifying and using less "stuff." This is a challenge, especially in such a competitive capitalist environment. Our culture is fixated on materialism, and it is largely by design that this has happened. So the question of how we can get by with less needs to be answered for consumers. As Jess said, "We need to educate consumers on how to shop and consume all over again. AND we need to educate businesses on how to produce appropriately."

We began discussing the idea of no-waste solutions, which is what we agreed every design should strive for. Nature is a great example of beautiful no-waste design, for it recycles everything. Sometimes this may require going beyond what the client asks for and choosing a medium that will solve their problem without creating waste. It can definitely be difficult to convince some clients to try unconventional ideas in their marketing, so designers need to make a business case for more sustainable solutions. Eric K says that his company has had to become more creative with how they pitch ideas to clients to convince them that sustainable solutions are in their best interests. In this way, designers are becoming more strategic and consultative, and less likely to be just "making stuff." Green design requires asking more questions and digging deeper into truly effective and efficient communication.

So, we know that the industry is changing, but how can we help bring change about and make design sustainable? It begins with education, of both designers and consumers. As Eric B said, we need "influencers" in the profession to lead the way. We also need to be able to convince our clients (and fellow designers) that green design makes sense from a business and economic standpoint. Change will come about when designers really think about the effectiveness of their efforts and consider new ways of communicating. Learning what is effective, from a marketing standpoint, and carefully considering your audience, lead to design decisions that minimize waste and communicate well.

This big-picture thinking leads to design being used more as a process or a system than a tangible object. Graphic designers face the challenge of having to expand past visual, tangible design to "designing" ideas and solutions. We agreed that visual design will always be relevant, but it may be just one tool in a designer's toolbox. Design is, after all, mostly about ideas, but it seems that many designers are more focused on just making things pretty. Green design is deeper design - focused on solving problems and creating meaning.

In my next post I will finish summarizing our first Green Design Dialogue, covering our discussion of challenges facing the design industry and how we might address them, and some ideas for stimulating thought and action on sustainable design.

Sustainability is becoming a pressing concern to the graphic design community. Designers are buzzing about it as they try to green their own practices and make sense of it all. In order to tap into this buzz, I organized a round table virtual discussion with several people involved in the design industry to chat about green design and the growing sensibilities of sustainability in our field.

"Green Design Dialogues" was born as a way to build the green design community and learn from each other. Our first discussion, via instant messaging, was May 25th. We touched on a broad range of topics relating to green design, which I will report on in a series of "Green Design Dialogues" posts in coming weeks. This week, I'll introduce the crew involved with our first Green Design Dialogue and relay each designer's experience with green design before summarizing our discussion.

Involved in the chat were designers from various backgrounds. Bryn Mooth joined us from HOW magazine, a wonderful graphic design magazine that has recently started covering more green topics. Dani Nordin, founder and principal designer at The Zen Kitchen, brought to the discussion her experience with running a small design studio that focuses on green design. Eric Benson is a Professor at the University of Illinois and the creator of the wonderful green design resource renourish. Eric Karjaluoto works at the interactive services firm smashLAB in Vancouver, and was involved in creating Design Can Change, an excellent call to action for the design community. Jess Sand is an independent designer and writer at her communications studio Roughstock Studios, who also writes a great blog on "sustainability for the rest of us," Small Failures. And of course, your humble Green Options design writer, Megan Prusynski, brought everyone together for the chat.

We started off our dialogue with a quick introduction and by sharing our own experiences with green design. Eric K began by explaining, "At smashLAB we simply started out by trying to find ways to make our studio more sustainable. Along the way, we realized that there were many like that, and as a result tried to make some information available that we could share with others in the community." Thus, Design Can Change came about from the firm's efforts at greening their own practices and desire to share what they learned.

Bryn from HOW magazine mentioned that she has noticed a shift from talking the talk to walking the walk in the design community. She said, "It seems like we're starting to move beyond the theoretical discussion of making design sustainable (a la the AIGA conference a couple of years ago) and more towards actually DOING things about it." HOW magazine has seen an increase in promotions from paper companies touting their new FSC certifications or green power usage.

Both Jess and Dani's journeys into sustainability began with their own lives and moved into their businesses. Jess mentioned that she began with trying to live more sustainably on a personal level, and started sharing her experiences because as a writer, it was important for her to do so. She also recently earned her certification in sustainable business management. Dani began her professional life as an environmental activist and discovered graphic design through her activism. She began a career as a freelance designer and noticed from places she worked how wasteful offices were and how little attention was paid to the environmental impact of projects and business practices. Her studio is now a green certified business.

My interest with green design began in college while I was studying art and graphic design and trying to meld what I was learning with my love of nature and my inner environmentalist. I wrote many a paper about design ethics and my thesis topic was socially and environmentally conscious design. However our interests in green design began, we are all now seeing an awakening in the industry and a focus on sustainability and change, which makes us green designers very happy!

Over the past few years, green designers have started out by doing their own research. Most of us had jumped into green design by simply immersing ourselves in it. Dani noted the importance of reading a lot for her, so that she knew a lot about the subject before getting started. Several of us have noticed that there are more resources about green graphic design now than just a couple of years ago, and, as Jess said: "With so much out there (some good, some junk), we're going to see a few places rise to the top. I just hope they're good ones" like renourish and Design Can Change.

Each designer's journey to sustainability is unique, and we've all had our stumbling blocks along the way. We discussed that each person approaches green living and green design differently, making different tradeoffs and decisions. It was certainly apparent to all of us that our industry was changing, and the green design movement was certainly getting traction. Eric K suggested that the surge of interest in green design stems from An Inconvenient Truth. What began as a grassroots movement has become a mainstream dialogue that is leading to action and change.

Businesses have begun taking an interest in sustainability as a strategy and a competitive advantage, and sustainable options are something designers are starting to offer their clients. Designers and communicators are taking responsibility for their work. We all agreed that sustainability was very important for the design industry because creatives are the makers of many things and communicators with many people. We are responsible for putting messages out there, we have the power to communicate, educate, open minds, or incite change. Graphic designers also use a lot of paper. As Jess pointed out, "Paper use has increased 20-40% since the advent of the paperless office." Dani mentioned her aversion to creating direct mail pieces since the beginning of her career.

Overall, people are beginning to take responsibility for their environmental impact and be more conscious of what they can do. As Eric K put it, "It's simply an issue of responsibility. We don't drive recklessly, and we shouldn't be living so either." Many industries are making changes as they learn more about environmental responsibility. The paper industry has recently made a huge push to go green and the design industry is changing along with it. The momentum is only going to grow from here… and designers will certainly play a role.

In the next post on Green Design Dialogues, I will share more about our May 25th discussion. We discussed the next steps for green design, working with clients towards sustainability, paper and beyond, and ideas for spreading sustainability within the design industry and the world.