What is Sustainable Design?

I started questioning designed objects that are labeled "sustainble" by the designers. Some of them are smartly designed so to limit the material used, have extended life after its original purpose, but some use plain using recycled paper and are called eco-friendly—but really, does that qualify as sustainable?

Definition of Sustainable Design (from Wiki)
Sustainable design (also called environmental design, environmentally sustainable design, environmentally-conscious design, etc) is the philosophy of designing physical objects, the built environment and services to comply with the principles of economic, social, and ecological sustainability.
The intention of sustainable design is to "eliminate negative environmental impact completely through skillful, sensitive design". Manifestations of sustainable designs require no non-renewable resources, impact on the environment minimally, and relate people with the natural environment.

Sure, using recycled paper is one of the first steps (and essential material) to reduce the negative impact on design, but it's not enough. For a print design to be environmental smart is to design with little material, have other functional purpose after its original intent, and causes few or NO harm to our world during process and afterlife of the object. Or better yet, the design should be beneficial to the environment.

I found out of Pangea Organics facial and body care product about a year ago and instantly fell in love with it. Not only is the product itself good, the packaging is great! Pangea collaborated with IDEO for their packaging. They used glass and recycable plastic for the containers, screenprints when possible so to eliminate lable use, and uses molded fiber boxes with no adhesive. Their boxes are 100% post-comsumer fiber and are embed with seeds. They encourage customers to plant their boxes to grow a beautiful or edible plant instead of ending in the landfill.

A set back of their packaging is cost. It is more expensive to have molded boxes with embedded seeds, but the impact on our world is huge. And as their target audience is environmental conscious group, their products, though the product is more expensive, the good is greater than cost.

Read more on the packaging design here on Sustainable is Good.

I was at Borders a few weeks back and saw that they were 50% off. I grabbed two soaps without thinking. I still have my boxes from my previous purchase, and I'm still waiting for Spring to arrive so I could plant them. Maybe next Spring I'll finally find the courage to grow my boxes...