Design Declares
What is Design Declare?
Design Declares is a growing group of designers, design studios, agencies and institutions here to declare a Climate and Ecological Emergency and take action. We span communication, digital, industrial and service design.
The campaign urges designers from all disciplines to acknowledge we are in a Climate and Ecological Emergency and offers the Eight Acts of Emergency as guidance for getting started. By signing the declaration you are pledging to improve your understanding of the climate impact of your projects and clients, and to work on reducing their impact. There is no requirement to have policies or action plans in place; this is about opening up the conversation with clients, suppliers and fellow designers.
Why did we get involved in the early days?
At Studio Wood, we got involved with Design Declares from its inception due to a desire for the design industry to face the truth about its part in the Climate and Ecological Emergency. As a team of designers, it's in our nature to pursue positive change. Right now, we feel an urgency to help change humanity's impact on the natural environment and we believe Design Declares can be the catalyst that accelerates the change our industry needs. As a team, we are also very passionate about sustainability both personally and professionally. We are a team of zero waste shoppers, wild food foragers and personal care refillers.
We also recognised that sustainability knowledge was being developed in siloed pockets within each agency or in-house team, rather than as a design community. Whilst it’s great that many agencies are enhancing their own sustainability expertise and tools, there could be far greater impact if they were an open source for the greater good. Sustainability can also be intimidating, there is so much to learn, iterate and quantify. Design Declares is a great opportunity to change the paradigm around openly sharing specialist knowledge.
At Studio Wood we are lucky to already work with clients that take sustainability seriously, and have been able to implement circular economy design principles and work with recycled polymers in many of our current projects. However, it's been a bumpy road with many trials and tribulations along the way; we've still got a lot to learn. The knowledge of sustainable materials, manufacturing processes and tools is developing at speed, so if we are to rise to the challenge of this global crisis, we all need to keep sharing that knowledge.
Why sign up?
The Climate and Ecological Emergency is the most defining issue of our time. Signing up for Design Declares is joining a movement to create positive change in our industry. It is estimated that over 80% of all product-related environmental impacts are determined during the design phase of a product (European Commission EU Science Hub), so as designers we cannot ignore the role we have to play.
Equally, Design Declares is a supportive tool. Each of the Eight Acts of Emergency is broken down into actionable steps and supported with tools and resources across industrial, digital, graphic, communication and service design. Supporting your design team to take action.
To highlight the great tools and resources we have picked out some of our personal favourites:
Hayley - The EcoChain Mobius LCA software is a great tool for calculating the carbon footprint of early concepts. It allows you to iteratively develop concepts to lower their impact for example by comparing material choices. It’s great to have an estimated carbon footprint for each concept as early in development as possible. (This tool supports act 4 - Measure what we make: Measure the environmental and social impact of our work and design projects, and hold ourselves to account for what we find out.)
Céline - The Manufacturing Guides : Sustainable Materials, Processes and Production is a book compiling detailed information and analysis on more than 30 materials, processes and material life cycles. Besides being a great learning tool you can refer to during the design and DFM phases, it can also be used as inspiration on mechanisms and manufacturing processes. (This tool supports act 6 - Educate, accelerate: Build and foster intra- and cross-discipline knowledge networks to share tools, resources and best practice to accelerate progress in our industry.)
James - A friend recommended the book Drawdown: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed To Reverse Global Warming to me a few years ago now. It’s an excellent, comprehensive list of the methods we can use as a species to collectively reverse our current trajectory. There are high-ranking changes that may be a surprise to some and well worth becoming accustomed to. The book is part of the wider Project Drawdown online resource which is well with checking out. (This tool supports act 6 - Educate, accelerate: Build and foster intra- and cross-discipline knowledge networks to share tools, resources and best practice to accelerate progress in our industry.)
Liam - The PolyCE Circular Design Guidelines is a document with invaluable technical advice on both designing products for recycling, and designing products from recycled polymers. Funded by the European Commission and drawing from the expertise of many specialist organisations and recycling professionals, it helps demystify the WEEE recycling process for electric and electronic devices (although the advice is also applicable to many products which don’t contain electronics). It offers clear advice on how to design and detail product housings so that parts can be easily separated and valuable materials more effectively recovered. It also offers guidance on material selection and breaks down the challenges and limitations involved in working with recycled plastics, illustrated by case studies of real-world products. (This tool supports act 2 - Start the journey: invest in educating ourselves and our teams on methods of sustainable and regenerative design, and show leadership by making measurable changes to our practice.)
What do I need to do to sign up?
If you are interested in signing up but unsure if it's the right fit for you, your agency or in-house team; keep reading for further details:
Design Declares is open to individuals and institutions working in industrial, digital, graphic, communication and service design.
To declare, you must be a company with an office in the UK employing at least one full-time designer. We also welcome declarations from practising freelance designers who are registered as self-employed in the UK.
You can be years into implementing a climate impact strategy within your organisation or this could be the very first step you take. The important thing is that by signing the declaration you are committing to action. Everyone is going to be at a different place in the journey. We are not here to call anyone out. We are here to support each other to move the industry in the right direction.
There is no financial contribution - it's a free initiative for positive change, although you are committing to action which will require some time contributions.
If you have read this far, we hope that you will take the next step and sign up via the website to join as a signatory. Equally, if you have any outstanding questions please reach out, we will be happy to jump on a call or answer any queries via email.
Join us as we design a climate-positive future.
