T317   Innovation: designing for change

Block 2 Unit 2 Design-led innovation

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2.1

Contents

• Introduction
• 1  The international organisation
  • 1  The vision of Interface
  • 2  A new way of doing business
  • 3  Design with purpose
  • 4  Examples of sustainable innovation at Interface
  • 5  Products to services
• 2  Sufficiency
  • 1  What does sufficiency mean?
  • 2  Meeting needs
  • 3  Obsolescence and durability
• 3  The designer-maker
  • 1  Design narratives
  • 2  Product to service
  • 3  Making and remaking
  • 4  Reflecting on Keep and Share
• 4  Technology crafts
• 5  Comparing stories of innovation
• 6  Summary
• References
• Acknowledgements

Introduction

In Unit 1 of this block we developed an understanding of sustainability and explored some of the definitions and principles that are used to explain it. We specifically looked at the relationship between sustainability and efficiency in the context of resources, economics and development.

It is important to note that although the problems of sustainability won’t be tackled by efficiency alone, new technologies, strategies and practices concerned with efficiency have had many positive impacts in reducing the environmental damage caused by human activities.

• Increased efficiency of energy used by domestic products such as fridges and freezers (over 50% in recent years).
• Lighter weight, more fuel-efficient cars and an increasing number of hybrid and electric cars.
• More environmentally benign modes of travel in urban centres, e.g. the London bike hire scheme.
• Better insulated houses and improved building standards, with many products on the marketplace encouraging us to consider home improvements in this area.
• Increased domestic use of solar power generation and solar thermal technologies, encouraged by (for example) feed-in tariff schemes that pay a KWh price for the energy generated.
• Businesses, partly in response to increasing environmental legislation, becoming more efficient thus saving resources and limiting waste; it makes business sense to save material and energy resources, limit wastes and work with infrastructures supporting reuse and recycling to make your business as financially viable as possible. Efficiency related strategies and actions are becoming more and more central to many business operations and also, to some degree, more influential on individuals’ and households’ ‘consumption behaviour.

In this unit, we want to prompt you to see things from different perspectives and develop an understanding of the complexity and breadth of sustainable innovation opportunities, with a specific focus on textiles. In the context of textiles, you will read a couple of innovation stories that reflect different scales of approach towards efficiency and sufficiency. At one level we have the international company, Interface, the world’s largest manufacturer of carpet tiles who have endeavoured to adopt strategies and practices of efficiency throughout their entire organisation. We look at how their mission permeates the organisation and how that manifests at the level of design and innovation.

Before we look at the second innovation case, we take some time to think a little more about the idea of sufficiency – a term that I introduced in Unit 1. Connected to sufficiency we explore the concepts of human needs and how these need to be met differently in the future. We explore different reasons for product obsolescence (that also undermine strategies of efficiency) and consider product durability as a response to this.

Our second innovation case illustrates design and innovation activity at the smaller scale of business – the lone entrepreneur – addressing sufficiency (and to a lesser degree, efficiency) in her designer-maker business. Although this may seem a rather fringe initiative in terms of its scale and reach for driving sustainable change, I think it is important to understand a principle here: how individual values and actions are important in developing new practices of sustainability. Perhaps it will inspire you to consider the impact of collective individual actions in developing different insights and responses to sustainability.

This small-scale perspective has relevance to new initiatives in emerging economies. We take a brief look at an example of this in terms of technology crafts in India where small businesses adapt and hack the materials and technologies from existing electronic products to make new ones.

I hope this unit leaves you feeling inspired about the many directions sustainable innovation can take

1  The international organisation

1.1  The vision of Interface

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(www.interfaceglobal.com)

Figure 2.1  Founder and CEO of Interface, Ray Anderson

View description – Figure 2.1  Founder and CEO of Interface, Ray Anderson

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Over a decade ago now I spent a few days with Ray Anderson (CEO, Interface) at Schumacher College where he was teaching as part of a Business and Sustainability module, alongside Ed Mayo, then from the New Economics Foundation (NEF is the UK’s leading think tank promoting social, economic and environmental justice). Ray, unfortunately no longer with us, was an inspirational speaker when it came to issues of sustainability in the business context. He took us through his own personal journey from the founder and chairman of Interface, an international manufacturer of carpet tiles, to the champion of a new form of business, one rooted in ecological boundaries.

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(www.interfaceflor.co.uk)

Figure 2.2  Interface flooring

View description – Figure 2.2  Interface flooring

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Ray conveyed to us his journey since his ‘epiphany’, as he termed it, after reading Paul Hawken’s book Ecology of Commerce eight years earlier in 1994. His vision for Interface was to create a company that would have zero environmental impact by 2020 (a vision later termed ‘Mission Zero’). He created a sustainability team and together they developed a plan for sustainability in the company. This centred on the analogy of climbing a mountain – as Ray said, like Everest but much, much harder – a mountain of sustainability that would have to be scaled on a number of different fronts in order to successfully reach the summit. The Interface team identified the ‘Seven Fronts’ shown below.

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Interface’s Mount Sustainability and the Seven Fronts

Front 1 Eliminate waste: eliminate all forms of waste in every area of business.

Front 2 Benign emissions: eliminate toxic substances from products, vehicles and facilities.

Front 3 Renewable energy: operate facilities with 100% renewable energy.

Front 4 Close the loop: redesign processes and products to close the technical loop using recovered and bio-based materials.

Front 5 Resource efficient transportation: transport people and products efficiently to eliminate waste and emissions.

Front 6 Sensitise stakeholders: create a culture that uses sustainability principles to improve the lives and livelihoods of all of our stakeholders – employees, partners, suppliers, customers, investors and communities.

Front 7 Redesign commerce: create a new business model that demonstrates and supports the value of sustainability-based commerce.

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1.2  A new way of doing business

This idea of a ‘whole company’ shift in thinking and practice is very radical and Interface have travelled a long way in the intervening 20 years since Ray Anderson first had his epiphany. He describes in his first book Mid-Course Correction (Anderson, 1999) the underpinning philosophy of Mount Sustainability as this need to shift a regular company of the 20th century to a new way of doing business for the 21st century that addressed the dynamic cycling of resources (and wastes as resources) throughout the entire company and supply chain. Figure 2.3 shows the improvements Interface have made in reducing their emissions and wastes and in recovering resources since they introduced their ‘Mission Zero’ in the mid 1990s. Waste to landfill for example has now achieved the Mission Zero goal. Large reductions in water usage are also expected using a newly installed, closed system recirculation system. Interface demonstrate an industrial ecology model, seeking out opportunities to close resource loops, regenerate or eliminate wastes, use renewable energy and reduce the overall production impact of their products.

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Figure 2.3  Our progress to Zero

View description – Figure 2.3  Our progress to Zero

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This shift is based on the fundamental sustainability principle of working within the ecological limits of the Earth. The existing model of business doesn’t achieve this as it is underpinned by one-directional linear resource flows that drain resources from the system (as in the water butt analogy in Unit 1). Often the main concern of business in this regime is to sell more material things and to grow larger. Interface, pre 1994, followed this approach, and introduced office carpet tiles to the American market which had previously only been sold in Europe. Carpet tiles usually need to be replaced every ten years or so when they become marked and worn. This provided a steady repeat business and opportunities to develop new markets.

Interface’s strategy to shift away from this model in the mid-1990s and to develop new carpets, emerged from a deliberate effort to redesign the flooring business from scratch in order to eliminate all waste and pollution. As Jim Hartzfield of Interface explained to the authors of Natural Capitalism, product development began with seeking:

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‘New ways of directly satisfying customers’ needs rather than finding new ways of selling what we wanted to make’ and ‘”ecological thinking” led to radically expanding the possibilities we found to meet these needs rather than [to] a new list of constraints that narrowed the design or creative space.’

(Hawken et al, 1999, p. 141)

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Question

(1 hour)

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Look at Figure 2.3 ‘Our progress to Zero’. Which of the Seven Fronts of Mount Sustainability (see Section 1.1) do you think are represented in this statement of progress to Zero?

Describe how you think Interface Europe has achieved zero waste to landfill.

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Provide your answer…

View answer – Question

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Today Interface is globally recognised for their contribution to sustainable innovation and business strategy. For example, it was named the ‘Most Sustainable Large Corporate’ and also received the Grand Prix prize at the 2012 International Green Awards.

In terms of Mission Zero, Interface is on track to meet these goals. At the 2012 Green Awards Lindsey Parnell, President and CEO of Interface in Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEAI), responded to the award by stating:

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Interface is now well over halfway towards reaching Mission Zero, having achieved commendable results in areas such as waste management, renewable energy use, carbon reduction and social impact. …

Achievements include an 88 per cent reduction in waste sent to landfill, an 84 per cent reduction in water usage and a 32 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. 31 per cent of energy used by Interface is from renewable sources and 44 per cent of the materials that it uses are recycled or bio-based.

(Mundil, 2012)

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1.3  Design with purpose

You may be thinking ‘But what does design and innovation have to do with all of this?’ Let’s take a look at the main page of Interface’s website. It states:

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We are Interface

By definition, we are the world’s largest designer and maker of carpet tiles. For us, Design is a mindset and sustainability is the journey of a lifetime.

We are Design with Purpose

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The next activity will help you think about the relationship between design and innovation and Interface’s endeavours to respond effectively to the challenge that sustainability poses.

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Activity 2.1 Innovation and design

(1 hour)

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What do Interface mean by ‘Design is a mindset … We are Design with Purpose’? Watch Video 2.1 where the European Sustainability Director of Interface Flor talks about how design helps to address the challenges Interface encounter. Jot down a list of all the things that you think relate to innovation and design and see if you can also spot connections to the ‘Seven Fronts’ shown in Section 1.1.

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Video content is not available in this format.

Video 2.1  Interview with Ramon Arratia

View transcript – Video 2.1  Interview with Ramon Arratia

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Provide your answer…

View answer – Activity 2.1 Innovation and design

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In Video 2.1 the points discussed by the European Sustainability Director of Interface Flor connect to the first five fronts in the Mount Sustainability framework (as illustrated in my response to Activity 2.1). These all reflect design for efficiency strategies. All these points connect to the first five fronts in the Mount Sustainability framework. These are all connected to design and innovation for efficiency.

Ramon Arratia also discusses less tangible activities, such as influencing the behaviour of customers through explaining to them in detail things like the product characteristics and the relationship to sustainability, telling them the sustainability narrative of their products to explain sustainability goals through product /production /service characteristics.

He talks about the role of Interface as an influence on decisions around legislation – the idea that you should lobby to encourage tougher environmental targets, using the power of regulation to push the market to higher environmental standards. This is a very helpful thing to do if you know you’re ahead of the market in responding to these issues. These stakeholder issues connect to Interface’s Front 6 (Sensitise Stakeholders).

A final point to make is, as Ramon says, the need to redesign the way you do business (Front 7 Redesign Commerce). He uses the examples of translating products into services (e.g. leasing carpet tiles rather than selling them); and how you need to create value added services that can expand to adjacent markets at the same time (for example, Interface have shifted from solely focusing on commercial flooring to selling in domestic markets too).

1.4  Examples of sustainable innovation at Interface

Inspired by nature

Interface, as we’ve seen, wants to develop products that would minimise primary resource use. One of the strategies they adopted quite early on was to think about how nature ‘designs’ and what we can learn from observing plants, animals, microbes, soils, etc. This approach is known as biomimicry which means to be inspired by nature and to transfer nature’s designs into design and engineering opportunities. We will discuss biomimicry in more detail in Unit 3 when we look at a whole range of ecodesign strategies.

Interface asked their designers to consider how nature ‘does’ flooring! What emerged from this exploration was an understanding that in fact natural floors look pretty chaotic in terms of colours, patterns and textures (Figure 2.4). This inspired the idea that if you were to design carpets in a similar way you could possibly reduce the need to replace carpet tiles so frequently. Traditionally modular carpet tiles tended to be designed in one colour, so if a part of the carpeted area was worn or spoilt in some way you would need to replace the entire area of carpeting so that the new carpet didn’t stand out from the older carpet surrounding the damaged carpet tiles. This obviously resulted in good tiles being disposed of and replaced by new ones (good for business but not the environment).

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(Interface)

Figure 2.4  Interface designers inspired by the random pattern of the forest floor

View description – Figure 2.4  Interface designers inspired by the random pattern of the forest flo …

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One of the first Interface products that resulted from a biomimicry-led design approach was called Entropy (Figure 2.5).

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(Interface)

Figure 2.5  Entropy carpet tiles … design inspired by the random pattern of the forest floor

View description – Figure 2.5  Entropy carpet tiles … design inspired by the random pattern of the forest …

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Inspired by the forest floor, Entropy was a non-uniform carpet tile design based on chaos and disorder. These randomly coloured tiles could be used in any pattern and facing any direction. In high traffic areas where tiles show a lot of wear and tear, or when tiles get stained, customers can just replace them because the randomness of the design hides the new tiles amongst the older ones. Installing tiles in a non-directional pattern speeded up the installation process and also reduced the amount of waste produced in fitting the tiles to the floor area.

The benefits of random tiles and non-directional installations are:

• increased flexibility
• quick to install
• less waste
• longer life cycle
• easy to maintain and repair.

Entropy became the company’s fastest bestseller. The concept of randomness and non-directional carpet tiles is now a design strategy integrated across the Interface product range.

1.5  Products to services

The seventh front of Mount Sustainability emphasises the need to redesign the way of doing business to harness maximum efficiencies. Interface was an early adopter of the product to services concept. The environmental benefit of this approach is to reclaim and reuse resources. Interface retained ownership (control) of the product (resource) throughout its lifetime by leasing products to customers and maintaining the product in use throughout the contract period of the lease. They attempted to provide a commercial flooring service. This meant Interface kept control of how long their carpet products were used, when they should be replaced, repaired, reused and recycled. Interface can then understand how much resource it has in circulation to better plan how and when to generate new resources from old products in this circular resource flow (a scheme they call ‘life after life’). This was quite a radical shift in business operations and turned out to be too big a challenge for customers and the market to adapt. The box below describes the initial flooring service that Interface launched back in 1995.

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The Evergreen lease scheme

In 1995 Interface launched an Evergreen lease under which the company retained ownership of the carpet and remained responsible for keeping it clean in return for a monthly fee. Regular inspections permitted the company to replace only the carpet tiles that showed the most wear and tear, instead of the entire carpet as in the past. This more targeted replacement helped reduce the amount of material required by some 80%. In 1999 the company introduced Solenium, a material that lasts four times longer than traditional carpets, uses up to 40% less raw material and energy used to produce the carpet, and can be entirely remanufactured into new carpets instead of being thrown away or ‘down-cycled’ into less valuable products.

Only a half-dozen or so Evergreen leases were ever actually signed, as most customers opted for a traditional purchase instead. The programme did not succeed for a variety of reasons, some specific to the carpet business. Some customers felt the lease agreement was too complex or too inflexible, locking them into a long-term arrangement that limited their future options. But perhaps the biggest problem was cost – a reflection of Interface’s emphasis on high-quality material and high-quality maintenance services. In the end, the company felt compelled to drop the Evergreen lease.

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Question

(30 minutes)

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What factors prevented the Evergreen lease scheme from being a success?

Think of one thing you would have done differently to make the scheme more successful. Briefly describe how this would have benefited the innovation of ‘leasing’ rather than buying carpet tiles.

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Provide your answer…

View answer – Question

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To date Interface has not reintroduced a service option for its carpet tiles. Perhaps, in this era of concern over the future resilience of the energy supply, a more effective business model can begin to emerge that fully reflects the ecological costs of the system of flooring, and makes a lease model more attractive in terms of economic cost to customers. Interface does offer other services which don’t replace product sales, but rather augment them. For example Cool Carpet® is a carbon neutral service that works by purchasing verified carbon offsets that cancel out the GHG (greenhouse gases) emitted throughout the life of the carpet.

Other services relate to product takeback (ReEntry®), where for a fee Interface divert carpet from landfill, reclaim it and repurpose it where they can. They also offer a maintenance service in a traditional manner to a warranty, to protect and repair carpets in the use phase of their life.

What we see here is the potential difficulty of trying to move from a dominant business model (selling material things) to an ecology-driven model that attempts to control resource flows via services. We see this happening in other sectors too, for example Rolls Royce’s ‘Power by the Hour’ engine leasing scheme (Rolls Royce, 2012). In order to make these new business models more attractive and viable, other types of capital will need to be made more transparent. Remember Forum for the Future’s Five Capitals model from Unit 1? A new system of business that requires a more balanced view of all capitals that are evidenced when environmental impacts and ecological costs across the life cycle of material things are properly evaluated.

 

2  Sufficiency

We have explored efficiency from a number of different perspectives. Now I want to explore the idea of sufficiency from the perspective of people, our relationship with the planet and the material world that surrounds us. We introduced the concept of sufficiency in Unit 1, alongside efficiency, as a type of sustainable innovation strategy:

1. A technological response – efficiency – designing products and services to have a reduced environmental impact.
2. A social and cultural response – sufficiency – consuming the right quantity of material goods and services, a quantity that is appropriate for optimal health, wellbeing and happiness.

2.1  What does sufficiency mean?

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Figure 2.6  A cherished teddy bear

View description – Figure 2.6  A cherished teddy bear

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Sufficiency emphasises a more sustainable consumption of things. You may have considered sustainable consumption to mean buying ‘green’ products (like organic food or detergents made from natural ingredients) or buying products that can be recycled, are more energy efficient, or even keeping something for a long time because you cherish it (Figure 2.6). Undoubtedly the decisions we make about what we buy and what we discard are part of the sufficiency agenda, but it’s not just what, it’s also ‘how much’?

In Unit 1, Thomas Princen suggests sufficiency reflects a sense of ‘enoughness’. Let’s explain this idea of enoughness in the context of food. When you feel hungry you eat, but at some point most people know they’ve had enough, they’re satiated, and stop eating before they become bloated and feel ill. The problem with industrialised societies’ reliance on materiality as their language of novelty (remember Tim Jackson’s talk in Unit 1) is that we have become too bloated by consuming more and more material things to meet our perceived needs (Princen, 2005). Princen suggests that adopting sufficiency approaches is critical for ‘reversing the biospherical trends and re-organizing society for sustainable resource use. If the resource status of the past was abundance, an ever-present frontier, unending sources and sinks, now it is scarcity.’

Sufficiency, or lack of it, is a much trickier problem to resolve than efficiency. Efficiency can be measured. Actions can be connected to the raw materials, production, use and disposal phases of product lifecycles (where regulation can steer agendas) and organisations can be motivated to deliver new targets. Efficiency, in contrast to sufficiency, can be operationalised, evaluated and achieved. Sufficiency on the other hand predominately exists in the realm of the wishes, desires, demands and the real or perceived needs of different people and societies. The concept of sufficiency encompasses very broad social agendas where arguably there is less leverage to steer individual actions and choices. Developing sustainable strategies of production and consumption using both efficiency and sufficiency approaches is likely to require material and non-material innovations. In innovation terms this is often framed as a shift from products to services – an idea which we will explore in more detail in examples presented throughout the module.

Let’s take a step back for a moment to consider the ‘ingredients’ of consumption. There is a necessity to consume (meeting basic needs); a desire to consume (satisfying wants); and a pressure to consume (responding to our cultural language of novelty). For sufficiency to become a more embedded cultural phenomenon, we need to tackle our ‘consumption make-up’.

2.2  Meeting needs

Meeting needs is a fairly basic idea. You may be familiar with Maslow’s Hierarchy of human needs, represented by a pyramid moving from basic physiological needs such as having food and shelter at the base, to growth needs as you move up the pyramid, to the top which reflects the fulfilment of your creative potential (self-actualisation) (Figure 2.7). Maslow’s framework explains human motivation for doing things in clear, but relatively simple, terms. However, in order to explain needs in a context of resource consumption, I’m going to turn instead to a Chilean economist, Manfred Max-Neef, who for the last 30 years or so has been studying what motivates people’s choices, initially in South America, and then globally. Max-Neef states:

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In the traditional paradigm we have indicators such as the gross national product (GNP) that is in a way an indicator of the quantitative growth of objects. Now we need an indicator about the qualitative growth of people. What should that be? Let us answer the question thus: The best development process will be that which allows the greatest improvement in people’s quality of life. The next question is: What determines people’s quality of life? Quality of life depends on the possibilities people have to adequately satisfy their fundamental human needs.

(Max-Neef, 1991, p. 16)

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Figure 2.7  Maslow’s Hierarchy of human needs

View description – Figure 2.7  Maslow’s Hierarchy of human needs

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Max-Neef developed a framework of human needs in which he identifies nine fundamental human needs and four different forms in which these needs can be satisfied: BEING (our qualities and characteristics); HAVING (things, structures, support mechanisms); DOING (our actions); INTERACTING (the context and settings in which needs are met (or not)) (Table 2.1). Satisfiers, Max-Neef suggests:

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Define the prevailing mode that culture or society ascribes to needs. […] Satisfiers may include, among other things, forms of organisation, political structures, social practices, subjective conditions, values and norms, spaces, contexts, modes, types of behaviour and attitudes, all of which are in a permanent state of tension between consolidation and change.

(Max-Neef, 1991, p. 24)

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Max-Neef’s research shows human needs are universal across cultures and it is the way in which they are satisfied that is culturally determined.

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Table 2.1  Matrix of human needs and satisfiers

Need	Being	Having	Doing	Interacting
Subsistence	physical and mental health, equilibrium, sense of humour, adaptability	food, shelter, work	feed, procreate, rest, work	living environment, social setting
Protection	care, adaptability, autonomy, equilibrium, solidarity	insurance systems, savings, social security, health, systems, rights, family, work	co-operate, prevent, plan, take care of, cure, help	living space, social environment, dwelling
Affection	self-esteem, solidarity, respect, tolerance, generosity, receptiveness, passion, determination, sensuality, sense of humour	friendship, family, partnerships, relationships with nature	make love, caress, express emotions, share, take care of, cultivate, appreciate	privacy, intimacy, home, space of togetherness
Understanding	critical conscience, receptiveness, curiosity, astonishment, discipline, intuition, rationality	literature, teachers, method, educational policies, communication policies	investigate, study, experiment, educate, analyse, meditate	settings of formative interaction, schools, universities, academies, groups, communities, family
Participation	adaptability, receptiveness, solidarity, willingness, determination, dedication, respect, passion, sense of humour	rights, responsibilities, duties, privileges, work	become affiliated, cooperate, propose, share, dissent, obey, interact, agree on, express opinions	settings of participative interaction, parties, associations, churches, communities, neighbourhoods, family
Idleness [Leisure]	curiosity, receptiveness, imagination, recklessness, sense of humour, tranquillity, sensuality	games, spectacles, clubs, parties, peace of mind	daydream, brood, dream, recall old times, give way to fantasies, remember, relax, have fun, play	privacy, intimacy, spaces of closeness, free time, surroundings, landscapes
Creation	passion, determination, intuition, imagination, boldness, rationality, autonomy, inventiveness, curiosity	abilities, skills, method, work techniques	work, invent, build, design, compose, interpret	productive and feedback settings, workshops, cultural groups, audiences, spaces for expression, temporal freedom
Identity	sense of belonging, consistency, differentiation, self-esteem, assertiveness	symbols, language, religion, habits, customs, reference groups, sexuality, values, norms, historical memory, work	commit oneself , integrate oneself, confront, decide on, get to know oneself, actualise oneself, grow	social rhythms, everyday settings, settings which places one belongs to, maturation stages
Freedom	autonomy, self-esteem, determination, passion, assertiveness, open-mindedness, boldness, rebelliousness, tolerance	equal rights	dissent, choose, be different from, run risks, develop awareness, commit oneself, disobey	Temporal /spatial plasticity [anywhere]

(Table 1, pp. 32–33 ‘Matrix of needs and satisfiers’ in Human scale development- conception, application and further reflections)

End of Table

The fundamental needs are not hierarchical (as in Maslow’s description of needs) other than the very basic need of subsistence that relates to our physiological needs, satisfied by food, water, shelter and warmth. All other needs can be met through material and non-material means as illustrated in Table 2.1. Industrialised, material-focused cultures over-prioritise the consumption of economic goods as a means to meet needs. In truth this type of consumption often satisfies wants and a participation in the language of novelty, instead of meeting fundamental needs. A shift to focus on the latter may be a possible antidote to unsustainable consumption, but it requires new approaches to economic growth and development.

There are a number of different types of satisfier:

Satisfiers that meet needs

• singular satisfiers meet a single need (e.g. insurance systems to meet the need of protection or the ballot to meet the need of participation)
• synergistic satisfiers meet a number of needs simultaneously (e.g. breastfeeding babies meets the babies’ need for subsistence and also meets their needs for protection, affection and identity).

Satisfiers that do not address needs

• pseudo satisfiers give a false impression of meeting a need e.g. fashion fads give a sense that the need for identity is met; an over-reliance on mechanistic medicine (‘a pill for every ill’) can stimulate a sense that the need for protection has been met. It has been argued, for example, that statins treat conditions that result from high levels of cholesterol such as heart disease (which is a great health innovation) but don’t address the root cause of poor health, which often require changes in diet and exercise (NICE, 2014)
• inhibiting satisfiers: the way in which these satisfiers work inhibits other needs from being satisfied (e.g. the need for protection is met by an over-protective family which inhibits the fulfilment of other needs such as participation, freedom)
• violators: these satisfiers claim to satisfy a need but in fact make the need more difficult to meet (e.g. buying a gun for protection doesn’t foster the meeting of the need for protection, if collectively society supports this strategy and everyone has guns ‘for protection’, and ultimately results in a gun-saturated society with greater risks and a perceived need for a heightened level of protection overall).

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Activity 2.2 Satisfiers

(1 hour)

Start of Question

Think about these two satisfiers:

1. watching TV
2. belonging to a cycling club.

For each, determine which need(s) are being met and in what way these needs are satisfied.

What other products do you think inhibit or falsely meet fundamental human needs? Jot down a list of three products and the needs that are not met and upload to the forum. Thinking about where needs are not effectively met may provide some inspiration for developing ideas for your own projects later in the module.

End of Question

Provide your answer…

View answer – Activity 2.2 Satisfiers

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2.3  Obsolescence and durability

The last section suggested the goal of sustainable levels of consumption (sufficiency) may have some way to go before it is met, as not only are we consuming too many material things (in industrialised societies), but we’re also unaware that by consuming resources in this way, we are not necessarily satisfying our basic needs. At the same time large numbers of people in the industrialising world are also aspiring to ‘Western’ levels of consumption of material goods. This dynamic is wholly unsustainable and has major implications for development and growth (as described by Tim Jackson in Unit 1). While those shifting out of poverty have a real need for development and the infrastructures and securities that enable that, already industrialised nations are in a different position and have an opportunity to explore different ideas of growth and its relationship to material resource consumption. Innovations in technology alongside innovations that enable cultural shifts in perceptions can begin to nurture different types of non-material satisfier that will effectively meet our basic human needs.

Product obsolescence

Another consumption issue, particularly in relation to products and technology, is the planned lifetimes of material things – otherwise known as planned obsolescence. This is a major contributor to the speed at which materials and energy travel through the economic system. If efficiency is about reducing resource use, then sufficiency is about making the resources we do use go further – ‘more from less’. This is a much harder message to ‘sell’ as it contradicts the conventional wisdom of a business approach based upon planned obsolescence. Planned obsolescence (the purposeful design of a limited product life through either technological, physical or cultural product degradation) has provided a strong steer for industrialisation, particularly since the end of the Second World War. Writer and journalist Vance Packard wrote his forward-thinking book The Waste Makers in 1960, as a commentary on the increasingly short lifecycles and technological redundancy found across most product sectors (Packard, 1960). He described obsolescence in two categories: functional obsolescence when the product components fail; and obsolescence of desirability which reflects our desire to seek out novelty (perhaps best illustrated by today’s smart phones’ changing technology and aesthetics). Products become emotionally stale to their owners and consumers seek out replacements (Figure 2.8). Little has changed in the intervening 60 years with the average mobile phone replaced every 20 months (every ten months in the 12–17 age group) (EESC, 2013). Tim Cooper, a Professor of Sustainable Design and Consumption, undertook a survey of 802 households in the UK and found:

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The average age of appliances when discarded ranged from 4 to 12 years, depending on the type of product. Overall, one third of discarded appliances were reported as ‘still functioning’ (notably cookers, hi-fi and stereo, mobile phones and computers). As only around 24% of discarded appliances (by units) were intended for reuse, being donated or sold, it can be deduced that around one in ten still functioned but, even so, were discarded for recycling, incineration or landfill.

(Cooper and Mayers, 2002)

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Figure 2.8  Discarded consumer appliances

View description – Figure 2.8  Discarded consumer appliances

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As a note of balance to the planned obsolescence debate we should also add that it is not always the best environmental choice to hang on to an old product. Modern cars for example don’t rust as they used to and engines are much more efficient and last longer; fridges, as mentioned in Unit 1, have become over 50% more efficient in terms of their energy efficiency in use.

Start of SAQ

Question

(30 minutes)

Start of Question

Name two products made obsolete for each of these reasons:

• functional obsolescence
• obsolescence of desirability.

Why do you think the products were discarded?

End of Question

Provide your answer…

View answer – Question

End of SAQ

Extending product life

Although from an efficiency perspective we may find new ways to govern resource flows, it is also important to consider ways to extend product life where appropriate to do so. The concept of sufficiency supports new types of economic activity in terms of services of repair, maintenance and upcycling. Upcycling for example maintains or improves the value of the material. It protects the quality of the functionality of the material so, for example, high grade plastic mouldings would remain a high quality material with associated functionality, rather than being down-cycled where material quality is generally eroded and recyclates fulfil functions of a lower quality post processing. In other words, material quality is constantly reduced through recycling processes. It is therefore not efficient to consider recycling as a sustainable panacea; other mechanisms to retain value need to be promoted through our production and consumption metabolisms. Design for sufficiency includes the following strategies, which we will explore further in Unit 3.

• Repair, Reuse, Recycle
• Maintenance
• Adaptation
• Adornment (e.g. personalisation)
• Upgradability
• Product sharing
• Multi-functionality.

Start of Activity

Activity 2.3 Slower consumption

(1 hour)

Start of Question

We will finish this section by reviewing the relationship between efficiency and sufficiency. For this you are asked to read an extract from a paper by Tim Cooper (2005) titled Slower Consumption. Reflections on product life spans and the ‘Throwaway Society’, published in the Journal of Industrial Ecology.

(Note that the author references throughout and builds up the narrative with a good use of a diagram. These are things to take on board when you write for the TMAs and EMA on this module. Remember if you want to catch up on referencing style, the Library homepage points you to good resources – please use them if in doubt.)

Cooper draws out a relationship between efficiency and sufficiency, which is illustrated in Figure 1 of the extract. Look at this figure and read the accompanying text. Then answer the following questions.

1. How does Tim Cooper suggest we can slow down the rate of product consumption?
2. Name a problem with efficiency driven ‘green growth’.
3. What are the potential threats associated with sufficiency?
4. What are the benefits of a mixed efficiency /sufficiency approach to sustainable consumption?

Start of Extract

Slower Consumption. Reflections on product life spans and the ‘Throwaway Society’

A New Model

The potential contribution of longer product life spans to the complementary roles of eco-efficiency and slow consumption in enabling progress toward sustainable consumption is demonstrated in a model presented below in preliminary form (Figure 1). The slow consumption concept, it is recognised, requires further development; in the present context it means slowing the rate at which products are consumed (literally, ‘used up’) by increasing their intrinsic durability and providing careful maintenance.

The model’s starting point is that sustainable development needs to be driven by both efficiency and sufficiency (McLaren et al. 1998; Reish 2001). The case for eco-efficiency – increased resource productivity that enables simultaneous progress toward economic and environmental goals – is increasingly accepted as a political imperative and widely supported by industry (Holliday et al. 2002). It may not adequately reduce the environmental impact of consumption however, as noted above, and thus there is a need to reduce the throughput of products and services. Indeed, reference in the Brundtland report’s definition of sustainable development to meeting people’s “needs” is an implicit recognition that environmental constraints require a parameter of sufficiency (WCED 1987).

Start of Figure

Figure 1  Product life spans and sustainable consumption

View description – Figure 1  Product life spans and sustainable consumption

End of Figure

As the model indicates, eco-efficiency, by itself, leads to ‘green growth’. This is problematic if the environmental benefits gained from increased efficiency are offset by increased consumption through the rebound effect (Binswanger 2001). The prospect of slow consumption will be similarly unappealing if reduced purchasing of short-life products by consumers raises a threat of unemployment and recession.

Increased product life spans, whether through greater intrinsic durability or better care and maintenance, may enable such problems to be overcome by providing for both efficiency and sufficiency. They are a means by which materials are used more productively (i.e. the same quantity provides a longer service) and throughput is slowed (i.e. products are replaced less frequently). Meanwhile a shift to more highly skilled, craft-based production methods and increased repair and maintenance work would provide employment opportunities to offset the effect of reduced demand for new products.

The model thus indicates that longer product life spans provide a route to sustainable consumption whereby reduced materials and energy throughput arising from eco-efficiency is not offset by increased consumption, and the economy remains healthy because products are carefully manufactured and maintained and there is less dependence on rising consumption for economic stability. In summary, this preliminary model, which simplifies a complex reality, suggests that longer-lasting products are a prerequisite for sustainable consumption.

• Binswanger, M. (2001) ‘Technological progress and sustainable development: What about the rebound effect?’ Ecological Economics, 36(1): 119–132.
• Holliday, C.O., Schmidheiny, S. and Watts, P. (2002) Walking the talk: The business case for sustainable development Sheffield, UK:Greenleaf.
• WCED (World Commission on Environment and Development) 1987 Our common future Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.

(Journal of Industrial Ecology, vol. 9, nos. 1–2, 2005, pp. 51–67 (extract from pages 54–55))

End of Extract

End of Question

Provide your answer…

View answer – Activity 2.3 Slower consumption

End of Activity

 

3  The designer-maker

Start of Figure

Figure 2.9  Designer-maker, Amy Twigger Holroyd

View description – Figure 2.9  Designer-maker, Amy Twigger Holroyd

End of Figure

Amy Twigger Holroyd is a small-scale designer-maker and entrepreneur who incorporates a range of sustainable values within her work. Her story is one that particularly focuses on the concept of sufficiency, for example, by making things that last for a long time, and that can be maintained and repaired. This is the story of how she integrates these sustainable values within her design thinking and practice.

Start of Figure

Figure 2.10  ‘Keep and Share’ knitwear label

View description – Figure 2.10  ‘Keep and Share’ knitwear label

End of Figure

I went to meet Amy in her Hereford-based studio to discuss her passion for design and making and to understand how she links this to sustainability values in the context of her business practice.

The core concepts of Amy’s work are versatility and longevity. These connect to the concepts of efficiency and sufficiency and are represented in the title of her hand-made knitwear business Keep and Share.

Start of SAQ

Questions

(1 hour)

Start of Question

Watch Video 2.2 in which Amy explains the origins of her business concept and explains how Keep and Share connects to sustainability. Think about the following questions as you’re watching the film and then respond to them.

1. What interested Amy about the concept of sustainability?
2. How did she begin to embody the concept of sufficiency in her work?
3. What does Keep and Share stand for and how does it connect to the principles of efficiency and sufficiency?

Start of Media Content

Video content is not available in this format.

Video 2.2  Keep and Share

View transcript – Video 2.2  Keep and Share

End of Media Content

End of Question

Provide your answer…

View answer – Questions

End of SAQ

Start of Figure

Figure 2.11  Keep and Share knitwear

View description – Figure 2.11  Keep and Share knitwear

End of Figure

3.1  Design narratives

Start of Figure

Figure 2.12  Keep and Share knitwear

View description – Figure 2.12  Keep and Share knitwear

End of Figure

In this section we look at a couple of short videos reflecting different design narratives from Keep and Share. The first film describes how Amy approaches her design process, how she seeks inspiration for her knitwear design and how she works with her customers in meeting their needs. The second explores material choices and the larger sustainability context for design decision-making.

These films highlight Amy’s approach to her designer-maker practice in the context of sustainability. Consider this approach as you view the films as this is the focus of Activity 2.4 at the end of this section.

Design, process, people

Start of Figure

Figure 2.13  (a) The Gladys Cardigan (b) A page from Amy’s design book

View description – Figure 2.13  (a) The Gladys Cardigan (b) A page from Amy’s design book

End of Figure

Amy’s first knitted piece in the Keep and Share range, and her signature piece, is the Gladys cardigan named after her grandmother who taught her to knit. In Video 2.3, we asked Amy to explain why this is a classic piece and how the cardigan embodies the values of Keep and Share. Amy also discusses how she develops and records her design ideas, where inspiration can come from and describes the close working relationship she has with her customers.

Start of Media Content

Video content is not available in this format.

Video 2.3  Design, process, people

View transcript – Video 2.3  Design, process, people

End of Media Content

Amy aims to design for how people feel about their clothes, to try to encompass narratives into her designs that provide people with suggestions for how to wear her designs, and for them to develop their own stories of use. As her business has evolved, she has had increasing opportunities to talk to people about their own experiences of living with their clothes; it is these dialogues that provide inspiration for thinking about her maker practice and developing design responses to people’s needs.

Material talk

In this second short video, Amy describes how she selects her materials and the trade-offs that she has made from a sustainability perspective, during her time in practice.

Start of Media Content

Video content is not available in this format.

Video 2.4  Materials and sustainability

View transcript – Video 2.4  Materials and sustainability

End of Media Content

Hearing Amy talk about her design practice and the integration of sustainability principles highlights the complexity of implementing these concepts when you approach sustainability holistically. For example, Amy discussed the difficulty of sourcing materials. Historically – and today – the primary environmental focus of the textile sector is on the nature of the materials: whether they are organic or not, whether or not they contain recycled materials. The point she makes is that it’s pointless to specify organic materials if you’re not thinking systemically about the design system; for example, transporting organically grown materials from faraway places has a serious environmental impact. In terms of her small-scale business, the practicalities of finding a supplier who was willing to supply her with small amounts of quality yarn was paramount, over and above the environmental credentials of the yarn. She chose an Italian supplier of good quality yarn that aligned with her vision of long-term use and maintenance. This point illustrates the trade-offs to be made in implementing sustainability in practice: organic versus reliable sources; organic (international) versus local; pragmatism versus environmental criteria, etc.

Over the years, she has managed to source more UK-grown yarn and built up good relationships with her suppliers of cashmere and alpaca wool, so she can pass on to her customers clear and traceable stories, from fibre to garment. Amy has been pragmatic in her choices and kept her focus on the core vision of the business: that clothes can be designed for multi-functional use and for use over a long period of time because of the emotional values people build with their clothes.

Start of Activity

Activity 2.4 Design narratives

(1 hour)

Start of Question

What are the key features of Amy’s design approach to sustainability? Try and list at least three points and detail how you think each point links to efficiency and/or sufficiency.

You can represent these as a map or a bullet point list – be creative! Upload to ODS and comment on at least two other students’ responses.

End of Question

View answer – Activity 2.4 Design narratives

End of Activity

3.2  Product to service

Start of Figure

Figure 2.14  Riot and Return: a business service concept for leasing children’s knitwear

View description – Figure 2.14  Riot and Return: a business service concept for leasing children’s …

End of Figure

In Video 2.5, in the following activity, Amy explains how she tried to innovate at the level of the business model with a spin-off business called Riot and Return. The key concept of this was children – because, as she says, children literally don’t get the full wear out of clothes as they grow so quickly, so it made sense to think of a business model that encouraged the sharing of good quality knitwear for children. Parents would pay a monthly subscription for this ‘knitwear service’ where they would access a number of garments at any one period, returning one or more in exchange for others. This business proposition aimed to provide a useful service to accommodate childhood growth and reduce unwanted clothing that no longer fits.

A key design consideration was to design clothes that would wear well and that could be maintained and repaired while maintaining the qualities of the knitwear. Amy likened this idea of material wear to an old leather jacket that looks much better worn than when it’s shiny and new, because in its worn state it shows stories of wear. This is what she aimed to achieve with her Riot and Return clothing range (hence its name): to embrace play and wear while at the same time maintaining wearability.

In this business model, the business retains the ownership of the garments while selling the use of them, similar to the processes of user–product engagement we find in a traditional library, an online film library or in a car or bike share scheme as discussed in Block 1. The return of garments to the business allows for necessary repairs and maintenance to be carried out and for subsequent users to experience good quality, well cared for products while acknowledging that the ‘newness’ of the item will fade and be replaced with the signs of stories of others’ use.

This story (of a failed attempt at introducing a service-based model) highlights the need for a better understanding of how to effectively introduce new service-based initiatives that challenge current norms in terms of values and expectations . In this instance we have a culture of not sharing clothes (although, in the case of children’s clothes, there is an emerging culture of ‘preloved’ clothes via services such as eBay or shared wardrobes via the school playground). Amy’s business concept may have fared better today compared to 2008, at the height of economic uncertainty. However, key questions remain.

• How does a business model based on non-ownership and sufficiency compete with cheap supermarket clothing for example?
• What cultural changes are required for clothes exchange services to be embraced?
• Will increases in the costs of raw materials reprioritise opportunities for reuse and remaking?
• Will such changes force the global textile sector to reprioritise agendas and improve working conditions, ensure fair pay and eliminate child labour in global garment production?

The story of shifting from product to service is rarely simple; it connects issues across levels of innovation, across geographical locations, across cultures and technologies.

Start of Activity

Activity 2.5 Product to service

(1 hour)

Start of Question

Watch Video 2.5, which illustrates that thinking about service innovation is complex. Answer the following questions and describe three characteristics of Riot and Return that would help to create a successful service innovation today. List these and upload to ODS to share with others.

1. What were Amy’s aims for Riot and Return as a service design concept?
2. What challenges do you think the concept of Riot and Return faced?
3. What would you do today to develop Riot and Return as a successful service innovation?

End of Question

Start of Media Content

Video content is not available in this format.

Video 2.5  Product to service

View transcript – Video 2.5  Product to service

End of Media Content

Provide your answer…

View answer – Activity 2.5 Product to service

End of Activity

3.3  Making and remaking

Start of Figure

Figure 2.15  The Keep and Share knitting tent

View description – Figure 2.15  The Keep and Share knitting tent

End of Figure

The idea of ‘working with people’ to develop skills comes through in the concept of ‘share’. Amy explores knitting with people at festivals and craft shows, and in education contexts. She has run other educational projects, at festivals for example, that aim to engage people in making and specifically in the co-creation of knitted and crocheted installations. These represent a series of engagement activities that are supporting opportunities for people to reconnect, or connect for the first time.

Start of Figure

Figure 2.16  Making activities and outcomes

View description – Figure 2.16  Making activities and outcomes

End of Figure

Video 2.6 reflects on ideas of making and adapting garments, bringing personality and personal meanings into existing pieces. It focuses on developing new skills and understanding that allows individuals to embrace their own making and remaking challenges. Before watching the video read the following short sections describing key elements within it.

Adaptation: linking cuffs

Amy, through her doctoral research, has focused on understanding the technical skills to adapt and remake existing garments: for example, adapting a jumper to become a cardigan. This technical understanding manifests as a series of options for knitting ‘into’ garments, new collars, cuffs, openings, and adornments. Amy has developed a typology of techniques that allow the reworking and remaking of knitted garments. In Video 2.6, Amy explains the different options for linking cuffs to an existing garment. This technical knowledge opens opportunities to take mass produced knitwear and hack into it, producing unique garments with individual value.

Remaking skills

Amy created a knitting group to help with her doctoral research. It meets once a month to share knowledge about making and adapting knitted garments. Through discussion the group help each other to explore new ideas and skills by recreating garments, guided by Amy’s knowledge and technical expertise. The video illustrates the way in which the knitting group have evolved their thinking in relation to making and adapting garments. They discuss being more aware of their clothing choices and feeling more empowered to consider design choices that might even involve something quite radical like cutting into knitted garments! New knowledge and experiences open up new questions for people and in this instance this is demonstrated through the knitting group’s enthusiasm for a knitting /adaptation challenge.

In a broader context perhaps these types of experience can help us to reflect on our consumption behaviour and to question our motivations for consuming and create new opportunities to meet different types of need.

Start of Media Content

Video content is not available in this format.

Video 2.6  Making and re-making

End of Media Content

Start of SAQ

Questions

(30 minutes)

Start of Question

Reflecting on the broader context, do you feel that experiences of making can help us to reflect on our own consumption behaviour and question our own motivations for consuming? Do you think ‘remaking’ opens up new opportunities to meet needs in different ways? Do you have a personal example to share? You could discuss this with your tutor group or post a response on the forum.

End of Question

End of SAQ

3.4  Reflecting on Keep and Share

The story of Keep and Share is obviously small in scale, both in terms of the business but also in terms of the impact Amy’s products have on the global problems of sustainability. Nonetheless it is a story of vision and of values that particularly highlights an emerging practice of sufficiency that hasn’t, to date, been part of the sustainability narratives of large organisations or Governments and policy makers.

Amy’s story helps position the role of the designer-maker as educator, communicator and facilitator of change. Amy considers her work to be a form of design activism, in the sense that she is opening up new views on, and ways of living with, knitted garments. Given that change is required at all levels of society, from the top down redesign of economic systems to the bottom up change in individual behaviour, all our practices will input, favourably or not, to this journey of transition. In the 1990s there was a television advert about switching the lights off to reduce electricity consumption – the picture zoomed back from a single light switch in a room to a picture showing a cityscape – with lights turning off, one by one. Of course our single action to turn off a light doesn’t do much when it’s viewed in isolation. But collectively the scope for large improvements in energy efficiency is there.

Amy’s work illustrates a step forward in thinking about, and articulating in practice, the idea of remaking, repairing, creating – not as something removed from us but as something we can all engage with through the clothes we wear everyday.

The idea of crafting and remaking the material world is a powerful one and promotes the concept that there is potential to form things to meet our needs in ways that are meaningful to us. Ideas of remaking are briefly explored in the next section, in a totally different context – consumer electronic products.

 

4  Technology crafts

For many of you it will come as no surprise that you can adapt, alter, repair a cardigan – even though the technicalities of doing so are complex as the Keep and Share case has shown with, for example, over 450 ways to link cuffs to cardigans! If adaptation is a technical process in a cardigan, which seems a simple product, how does this idea of adaptation link to other more complex products like consumer electronics? What happens if we take this traditional view of ‘craft’ and apply it to an area less commonly associated with it, like electronic software and hardware?

Start of Figure

Figure 2.17  Adapting innovation – rebuilding technologies

View description – Figure 2.17  Adapting innovation – rebuilding technologies

End of Figure

Increasingly we are finding that the adaptation and ‘hacking’ of existing hi-tech products is a growth industry in technologically deprived areas of the world (Figure 2.17). Each product is viewed for its component and functional potential rather than as a complete product to sell on. Like the Keep and Share concept of encouraging greater utility through the durability of the garment, Technology crafts encourage the remoulding of existing products and their components in new versions of a product with similar functions or in completely different products with very different functions. These practices challenge and begin to unravel the process of industrialisation as we currently know it. Technology crafters view products not as end products but as raw materials for new products that meet different (local) needs.

Vinay Venkatraman, winner of the 2013 Victor Pananek Social Design Award explains his work in ‘technology crafts’, through which a mobile phone, a lunchbox and a torch can become a digital projector for a village school, or an alarm clock and a mouse can be melded into a medical device for local triage. This is a great story describing a new and emerging ‘silicon cottage industry’ (small-scale, home-based technology businesses) based on the capacity of individuals to reconfigure everyday objects. This happens at the local level, supporting local knowledge capacities whilst avoiding large costs, distribution distances and reliance on large-scale production. This vision of a digitally inclusive society is illustrated through two projects described by Vinay Venkatraman in the video below.

Start of Quote

Video 2.7 TED Talks: Technology crafts for the digitally undeserved

(Vinay Venkatraman: Technology crafts for the digitally undeserved, 2012, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/)

End of Quote

Start of Figure

Figure 2.18  Technology crafts: The multi-media lunchbox and the medi-meter

View description – Figure 2.18  Technology crafts: The multi-media lunchbox and the medi-meter

End of Figure

Start of SAQ

Questions

(1 hour)

Start of Question

1. What are the characteristics of technology crafts described in Video 2.7?
2. What were the multimedia platforms for single teacher schools made from?
3. Why do fieldwork to test ideas? What did they find in this case and how did they adapt the product?
4. What were the key problems with the remote healthcare system?
5. What was the purpose of designing the health screening tool (medi-meter)?
6. What is the medi-meter and what do you think is required to scale up the use of this product?
7. What is the potential for service innovation in each of these examples of technology crafts?

End of Question

Provide your answer…

View answer – Questions

End of SAQ

Do these ideas provide you with inspiration for new innovations? Perhaps the idea of creating new products out of a process of adapting existing or worn out products (Interface’s ‘life after life’ concept), or reframing the functions of a product in a service concept (like Amy’s Riot and Return business idea) may provide you with useful stimulus for your own project work later in the module.

 

5  Comparing stories of innovation

This week we’ve focused on two very different stories of design and innovation in textiles: one at the scale of an international organisation; the other at the scale of a lone designer-maker. Both stories show that the landscape supporting sustainable innovation is both diverse and interconnected, with many opportunities to reframe innovation.

Start of Activity

Activity 2.6 Comparing innovation in practice

(1 hour)

Start of Question

Reflect on the stories of Interface and Keep and Share. Consider each of the points presented in the table below and summarise how each point is addressed in the different stories we’ve presented to you.

Start of Table

	Interface	Designer-maker
Underpinning values
Design strategies used
Connection to efficiency
Connection to sufficiency
Opportunities for services
Linear or circular resource flows
Product, service or system

End of Table

Upload your completed table to ODS to share and discuss with other students.

End of Question

View answer – Activity 2.6 Comparing innovation in practice

End of Activity

 

6  Summary

This week we’ve looked at two stories of design-led innovation . Each tells us something about driving forth a vision for change. In the case of Amy Twigger Holroyd, the designer-maker behind the Keep and Share knitwear label, we see her values connected to sustainability and her desire to deliver alternative solutions to wearing and living through clothing over time. As a sole designer-maker she has found ways to share her enthusiasm and skills for adapting and remaking knitwear with a range of makers and customers. This idea of adaptation and remaking our material world is also evident in the case of Technology Crafts. While is may seem ‘obvious’ to think about adapting our clothing, deconstructing existing consumer electronics and repurposing components and casings to meet completely different needs is probably a less familiar idea. These processes that challenge normal responses to products and product use and that innovate through adaptation, offer interesting opportunities for new types of sustainable innovation.

In the case of Interface, the world’s largest producer of carpet tiles, we see how the driving vision of founding CEO, Ray Anderson, turned the organisation from a traditional business focused solely on the financial bottom line to one driven by principles of ecology. This vision was created through asking experts what and how to achieve the seemingly impossible feat of becoming a ‘Mission Zero’ organisation. Interface wanted to understand how to develop a circular economy; how to make product-leasing (services) work; how to integrate biomimicry and ecodesign as central design strategies. Essentially they want to understand how to turn a big ship around to face a new direction. We see from their story that Interface continue that journey of ‘Mission Zero’ today.

Amongst stories of design and innovation this week we also discussed sufficiency in more depth. We linked this concept to ‘meeting human needs’ and explored what constitutes fundamental human needs and how these can be satisfied in many different ways (Max-Neef, 1991). We also considered the issue of product obsolescence and the challenge this poses to reducing the degree to which we rely on resource flow through the economy. Strategies that extend product lifetimes through design for durability will be discussed in more detail in Unit 3.

Reflecting on Units 1 and 2 of Block 2, we see that sustainability and sustainable production and consumption rely on big changes in our social, economic and technical direction. Ideas like efficiency and sufficiency, when teamed together offer a new landscape of visions for innovation based around circular economies of resource flow (discussed in Unit 3), product durability and adaptability, meeting real needs and collectively developing a new language of novelty based on less consumption. Sometimes these developments may only be small steps but as we begin to see the collective responses to often complex challenges, new types of design and innovation begin to emerge to inform the organisational landscape, the sociocultural landscape and the landscape of governance and policy. Design and innovation can help shift thinking towards sustainability in and across each of these landscapes.

 

References

Anderson, R. (1999) Mid-Course Correction: Toward a Sustainable Enterprise: The Interface Model, Atlanta, GA, The Peregrinzilla Press.

Cooper, T. (2005) ‘Slower Consumption. Reflections on product life spans and the “Throwaway Society”’, Journal of Industrial Ecology, vol. 9, no. 1–2, pp. 51–67.

Cooper, T. and Mayers, K. (2002) ‘Discarded household appliances – what destiny?’, Greening of Industry Network Conference [Online], Göteborg, Sweden, June. Available from www.academia.edu/528519/Discarded_household_appliances_what_destiny (Accessed 10 January 2014).

European Economic and Social Committee (2013) ‘CCMI/112 Product lifetimes and consumer information’, Towards more Sustainable Consumption: Industrial Product Lifetimes and Restoring Trust Through Consumer Information, Brussels, EESC.

Hawken, P., Amory, L. and Hunter, L. (1999) Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution, USA, Little, Brown and Company.

Max-Neef, M. (1991), Human Scale Development – Conception, Application and Further Reflections, London, The Apex Press.

Mundil, H.E. (2012) Interface bags International Green Awards [Online]. Available at: www.greenawards.com/press/2011-media-coverage/interface-bags-international-green-awards (Accessed 13 December 2013).

National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) (2014) Lipid modification: cardiovascular risk assessment and the modification of blood lipids for the primary and secondary prevention of cardiovascular disease [Online], NICE guidelines [CG181], July. Available from www.nice.org.uk/guidance/CG181 (Accessed 28 July 2014).

Packard, V. (1960) The Waste Makers, New York, D. McKay Co.

Princen, T. (2005) The Logic of Sufficiency, Cambridge MA, The MIT Press.

Rolls Royce (2012) Rolls Royce celebrates 50th Anniversary of Power-by-the-Hour, Press Release, 30 October. Available at www.rolls-royce.com/news/press_releases/2012/121030_the_Hour.jsp (Accessed on 3 July 2014).

 

Acknowledgements

Grateful acknowledgement is made to the following sources:

Figure 2.1: Interface Global

Figure 2.2: Interface Global

Figure 2.3: Interface Global

Figure 2.4: (top) Mark Penny / Dreamstime.com

Figure 2.4: (middle) Interface Global

Figure 2.4: (bottom) Aivolie / Dreamstime.com

Figure 2.5: Interface Global

Figure 2.6: Gwendolen Tee / www.flickr.com. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-ShareAlike Licence http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/

Figure 2.8: Clarkland Company / www.istockphoto.com

Figure 2.9: Courtesy Amy Twigger Holroyd / www.keepandshare.co.uk

Figure 2.10: Courtesy Amy Twigger Holroyd / www.keepandshare.co.uk

Figure 2.15: Courtesy Amy Twigger Holroyd / www.keepandshare.co.uk

Figure 2.17: Gaianet Foundation

Figure 2.18(a) and (b): www.ted.com

Every effort has been made to contact copyright holders. If any have been inadvertently overlooked the publishers will be pleased to make the necessary arrangements at the first opportunity.

 

Question

Answer

I think the first five Fronts of Mount Sustainability have been explicitly addressed here:

1. Eliminate waste (reducing waste to landfill, reducing waste water, reducing waste in energy production).
2. Benign emissions (reducing Green House Gas (GHG) emissions, reducing overall emissions from energy (renewables, reducing energy consumption)).
3. Renewable energy (95% use of renewable energy, use of locally generated bio-gas).
4. Close the loop (redesign of supply / production to eliminate waste to landfill).
5. Resource efficient transport (reducing energy consumption, reducing GHG emissions).

I also think Fronts 6 (Sensitise stakeholders) and 7 (Redesign commerce) will have been utilised in developing mechanisms to reduce waste to landfill and achieve greater lifecycle efficiencies, not only in production but also in use and end of life (e.g. ‘Entropy’ carpet tile service, product take-back business model, recycling of used product in production of new product).

How to eliminate waste to landfill:

• Eliminate non-reusable (e.g. toxic) resources in production processes.
• Reduce production waste (closing loops, waste recovery).
• Use biodegradable resources in production processes.
• Use recycled content in products.
• Reuse and recycle products from Use phase.
• Develop take-back business models (e.g. flooring services rather than selling carpet tiles).
• Explain closed loop resource principles to supply chain, customers, sector and relate to business strategies and goals.

Back to Session 1 SAQ 1

 

Activity 2.1 Innovation and design

Answer

European Sustainability Director, Ramon Arratia raises lots of design-related issues:

From an operations and product efficiency perspective he highlights:

• Reducing carbon emissions – target zero (connects to Fronts 1 and 2).
• As an organisation, aiming to use 100% renewable energy (connects to Front 3).
• Recycling wastes – developing strategies to deal with post-consumer waste too (connects to Fronts 1 and 4).
• Products into products – he calls it life after life – this constant cycle of old products being returned and separated and every element reused in new products – a circular flow of resources than aims for 0% waste in the future (connects to Front 4).
• Reducing impacts of transport – shifting from road to rail, barge and other less impacting forms of transport (connects to Front 5).
• He highlights the value measurement in product design and uses the example of life cycle assessment (LCA). They have done LCAs for all of their products to determine the actions they need to take in reducing sustainability impacts. They found the biggest impact of their products was the raw materials (the yarn) – this accounted for 71% of the overall impact; production and transport each accounted for 8% of the overall impact; 6% of impact was found to be associated with the use and maintenance stage of the product’s life. Interface has therefore focused on reducing the impact of the raw material – the yarn – in the following ways:
  • reducing the amount of yarn required in the product, and
  • increasing the recycled content of their products. An example of this is a micro tufted yarn that contains over 40% post-consumer waste.

Back to Session 1 Activity 1

 

Question

Answer

Factors that influenced the (lack of) success of the Evergreen scheme include:

• Lack of customer familiarity, and therefore the benefits of, the concept of leasing flooring
• Long-term, inflexible leasing contract
• Economic viability – unfavourable comparison of costs and benefits between leasing and purchase

The effectiveness of the scheme would have been improved by addressing the pricing of the service in relation to the dominant ‘short term’ pricing strategies of current marketplace:

1. to either reduce costs of service to demonstrate resource effectiveness of take-back to company and benefits of service to customers over time.
2. to make the life-cycle costs of service more transparent and to deliver additional service to customers, integrated as part of Evergreen leasing charge.

Back to Session 1 SAQ 2

 

Activity 2.2 Satisfiers

Answer

1. Watching TV meets the need of leisure but it can be an inhibitor satisfier as too much can over satisfy a need for leisure and inhibit the meeting of other needs such as participation, understanding and creation.
2. Belonging to a cycling club is a synergistic satisfier. It simultaneously meets the needs of subsistence (health), affection, participation, leisure and identity.

Product: Coffee machine

It is designed to meet the need of subsistence (it does) and possibly the need for identity in the context of owning a particular experience – relating to others with that experience – and it possibly does that too.

Because of the convenience of making coffee, perhaps the machine inhibits meeting my needs of participation, leisure and creation that may have been achieved by meeting people face-to-face for a cup of coffee in a café and experiencing different types of interactions.

Back to Session 2 Activity 1

 

Question

Answer

• iPhone – obsolescence of desirability. The phone was still fully functional but the person wanted the latest model. (It probably wouldn’t be disposed of in terms of being ‘thrown away’, but would more likely have been traded in or kept as a spare phone.)
• Kettle – functional obsolescence. The element on the kettle broke and because of the way it had been designed and manufactured, the element unit could not be replaced.

Back to Session 2 SAQ 1

 

Activity 2.3 Slower consumption

Answer

1. Tim Cooper suggests we can slow down the rate of product consumption by increasing product lifespans through increasing their durability and increasing opportunities for maintenance.
2. A problem with efficiency-driven approaches to sustainability is that the benefits of environmental improvements can be offset by increased consumption through the rebound effect.
3. The potential threats associated with sufficiency are slow consumption, which can lead to recession and unemployment (if the economic system is not redesigned!).
4. The benefits of a mixed efficiency/sufficiency approach to sustainable consumption is that longer product lifespans reduce material and energy consumption, they are not offset by increased consumption, and the economy remains healthy because there is less dependence on rising consumption (products last longer) and there are additional trades (employment) required to service longer life products.

Back to Session 2 Activity 2

 

Questions

Answer

1. Amy was first interested in sustainability through the ideas of efficiency and sufficiency and the differences between them. She describes how she felt most of the commentary about sustainability was, and is, basically related to efficiency – perhaps, she felt, because it was an easier target for business to address as it linked directly to cost-saving. She became more interested in what she perceived as the more complex issue of sufficiency and how she, as a designer could relate to that in terms of getting more satisfaction of need out of less material stuff – developing design responses to what we really need.
2. One of the first projects Amy undertook reflected the idea of sufficiency was her Masters project, ‘cuff in a blanket’. She describes a large piece of knitwear (like a cosy blanket that someone would wrap themselves up in and wear in different ways) anchored at a point by a ‘cuff’ (a wrist, an ankle) and that fits any size or shape of person. It is unisex and versatile in that the user determines how it is worn. It is a multifunctional piece of clothing in that the nature of its wearability is flexible and not prescribed in ‘one way’ by its design. Cuff in a blanket reflects ideas of sufficiency through ‘sharing’. It is designed to be shared by multiple users, being one size and unisex. Sharing products results in a greater level of utility from the resources across the lifespan of the garment.
3. Keep reflects longevity, efficiency and sufficiency by promoting a vision of long-term clothing that transcends fashion trends and remains a valuable wardrobe item over the years. Keep and Share garments are more expensive than mainstream high street and supermarket offerings. The business philosophy represents bespoke handmade and classically designed knitwear constructed from carefully sourced materials. In addition Amy provides information and support regarding lifetime use and care. This involves advice and services on maintenance, clothing care and repair. Good quality materials and carefully made products result in garments that can weather the wear and tear of everyday life. Her business model requires people to invest in pieces of clothing for the long term and evokes the need to cherish and care for these items over time. Keep embodies her vision of longevity.

Share reflects versatility and sufficiency as a response to demand-side issues of over-consumption in industrialised countries. Her business concept aims to encourage people to build emotional connections to their clothing and to explore ways of using, adapting and sharing their clothing with friends and family. Her garments are designed with this in mind and aim to promote versatility in the use phase of the life cycle – different people using the garment and different uses of that garment in terms of using it in many different contexts. Sufficiency is a challenging idea to base a business model on as its logic suggests less consumption and, as a consequence, less business. Amy discussed these issues and considered that because of the small scale of her business it would not really be affected by less consumption as people buy into the idea of keeping and understand this in terms of why there is a price premium to pay on handmade, well-made clothing.

Back to Session 3 SAQ 1

 

Activity 2.4 Design narratives

Answer

These are some possible points to draw out from Amy’s designer-maker practice:

• Quality and longevity of resources (efficiency and sufficiency – using less resources, minimising resource waste, encouraging long-term relationships with clothing)
• User-centred design approach (sufficiency – designing for people, with people – designing in meanings, creating memories, encouraging durability)
• Re-creating – (efficiency and sufficiency – working from her design archive, redesigning components, adapting archive for commissions – people developing relationships with their garments overtime)
• Building relationships with suppliers (efficiency and sufficiency – flexibility for small-scale maker (less waste), reliability of small-scale supply (less waste; building strong partnerships and trust))
• Building relationships with customers (efficiency and sufficiency – strong customer relationships = repeat custom, positive feedback, word of mouth marketing, longevity of garment use through repair and maintenance services, commissions of new work, customisation, training new skills)
• A holistic view of sustainable design (efficiency and sufficiency – developing an understanding of the sustainable issues and connections associated with different elements of garment production and consumption).

Back to Session 3 Activity 1

 

Activity 2.5 Product to service

Answer

1. Amy aimed to question the need to sell more and more stuff in a business model (sufficiency). She explored the idea of a subscription service for children’s clothing because children grow so quickly and wouldn’t get the wear or cost value out of the clothes through buying them (she realised she couldn’t sell clothes for children at the price her knitwear needed to be sold at).

From a design perspective the aim was to make a feature out of ‘wear’. Her idea was for kids to have fun, to ruin things (riot) and when those clothes are returned back to the knitwear library they would be cared for and regenerated. What excited her was the prospect of seeing how the same clothing would alter over time. The same garments would be worn differently, and repaired differently and over time, garments that had begun life ‘the same’ would be uniquely fashioned through wear and repair processes. This idea of narratives of wear seem to be a key feature of her design inspiration for the service.

• Cheaply available kids’ clothing
• A culture of ‘new’
• A culture of ownership
• The concept of ‘aging uniquely’ is not currently valued
• Cost of subscription service (perhaps – details are not provided – but would be similar to Interface’s Evergreen lease story if this were the case)
• Economic downturn
• Lone designer-maker already running one business.
• Research current subscription business models to price service appropriately
• Talk to organisations and networks such as M&S Plan A, Oxfam and Netmums, to gauge market appeal and scope of second hand clothing
• Develop catalogue of core versatile garments
• Develop communications that clearly link sustainability principles with values of wear
• Consider developing a connected service that develops repair, maintenance and remaking skills for people to apply to their own clothing.

Back to Session 3 Activity 2

 

Questions

Answer

• Emerging
• Informal education
• Non-institutional
• Local ‘fix it’ culture
• Local knowledge
• Cheap fabrication
• Low cost
• Quick
• Entrepreneurial

2. Multimedia platforms made from a projector mobile phone, a torch (LED plus batteries), a lunch box (housing) and some speakers.
3. Fieldwork allows you to test the product in situ. In this example they found that often schoolrooms let in a lot of light (broken roofs, etc.), children were noisy, that there were unreliable sources of power and problems downloading data. So this information fed into a number of iterations of the product’s development. In this instance they adapted the box from a lunchbox to a wooden, sturdy box with a photovoltaic panel and also the ability to charge from a car battery (ubiquitous kit in remote areas) and also to run off a USB key as a more reliable form of downloading data.
4. The remote healthcare system was under-resourced. There are 250,000 ASHA health workers providing healthcare in remote areas of India. They act as a conduit for referring people to medical centres that are again under-resourced and over-subscribed. There was no way of differentiating the more critical patients and everyone queued equally for long periods of time to be seen by the few medical professionals.
5. Medi-meter was an idea to help prioritise cases of ill-health in order for them to be fast-tracked to the medical centres. The rationale was that if you can have a basic diagnostic tool to measure basic health statistics you can make better judgements on who to send for treatment at the medical centres.
6. Medi-meter is constructed from an alarm clock, a sensor from a TV remote control, some components from a computer mouse, a few (cheap) parts that need to be pre-programmed and some local tinkering. These simple parts are easily accessible so what is needed is building up local ‘fix-it’ knowledge and awareness, and building a relationship between the large healthcare system and the localities that it serves – for example through distributing guidance re product adaptation.
7. Service opportunities:
   • Lunchbox – service of remote education. Teaming up remote schools to work together on projects and to share their limited resources and teacher expertise. The Lunch-box ‘curricula’ provides a connected platform for single teacher schools. Offers opportunities to link to other organisations and schools in different regions and countries.
   • Medi-meter – service of care – local communities develop capacities to build and use these and other simple healthcare tools, incorporating healthcare education. Local community centres act as distribution points for more basic healthcare needs and education, which takes the pressure off the main medical centres. Think back to the Koska K1 auto-disposable syringe innovation described in Block 1 – a relationship between a mass-manufactured product and the needs of developing countries. In contrast, technology crafts encourage local people to feel empowered to use simple technology to meet their needs.

Back to Session 4 SAQ 1

 

Activity 2.6 Comparing innovation in practice

Answer

Start of Table

	Interface	Designer-maker
Underpinning values	ecological limits	longevity, product relationships
Design strategies used	LCA, biomimicry, minimisation, reuse, recycle	durability, adaptation, repair, participation
Connection to efficiency	mission zero goals	using less across lifetime
Connection to sufficiency	dematerialisation (services)	product empathy, versatility, ability to be repaired, adaptation (bespoke design)
Opportunities for services	raising profile of ecological values makes economy of services more economically viable (as costs of natural capital rise) tried product leasing scheme – too early for market/new business model	tried product leasing scheme – too early for market/new business model opportunities for adaptation learning services
Linear or circular resource flows	moving from linear to circular (life after life model)	linear but encouraging behaviour change of customers to consider longevity of use.
Product, service or system	product, service and system of ecological business model	product and services of repair and adaptation and learning

End of Table

Back to Session 5 Activity 1

 

Figure 2.1  Founder and CEO of Interface, Ray Anderson

Description

A picture of Ray Anderson, founder and CEO of Interface.

Back to Session 1 Figure 1

 

Figure 2.2  Interface flooring

Description

A picture of Interface carpet tiles in shades and patterns of blue.

Back to Session 1 Figure 2

 

Figure 2.3  Our progress to Zero

Description

Figure 2.3 is an infographic of Interface’s progress to mission zero over a period from 1996 to 2014. It shows renewable energy usage has gone from 0% in 1996 to 95% in 2014; a reduction in water usage of 87% from 1996 to 2013; waste to landfill now at zero; 40% less gas used in production and energy used per unit of production is reduced by 50%. Greenhouse gas emissions are reduced by 90% between 1996 and 2014.

Back to Session 1 Figure 3

 

Figure 2.4  Interface designers inspired by the random pattern of the forest floor

Description

A montage of images showing fallen autumn leaves in all colours spread across the ground.

Back to Session 1 Figure 4

 

Figure 2.5  Entropy carpet tiles … design inspired by the random pattern of the forest floor

Description

Interface ‘Entropy’ carpet tiles in an office environment – illustrating random nature of colour and pattern.

Back to Session 1 Figure 5

 

Figure 2.6  A cherished teddy bear

Description

A picture of an old-fashioned, worn and well used teddy bear sitting on an old leather chair.

Back to Session 2 Figure 1

 

Figure 2.7  Maslow’s Hierarchy of human needs

Description

Maslow’s hierarchy of human needs represented as a pyramid, moving from physiological needs (food, warmth, shelter, water) at the base; to the next level of the pyramid which focuses on needs of safety (security, stability, freedom from fear); moving further up the pyramid to needs of belonging and love (friends, family spouse lover); to near the top of the pyramid, meeting needs of self esteem (achievement, mastery, recognition, respect); and at the very top of the pyramid, the needs of self-actualisation (pursue inner talent, creativity, fulfilment).

Back to Session 2 Figure 2

 

Figure 2.8  Discarded consumer appliances

Description

Discarded white goods and domestic electronic products piled high in landfill.

Back to Session 2 Figure 3

 

Figure 1  Product life spans and sustainable consumption

Description

Cooper’s model of longer product lifetimes that shows the drivers for longer lifetimes on the left hand side (efficiency and sufficiency); the reasons for increased product lifetimes in the middle (eco-efficiency through more productive use of material and energy, and slower consumption through reduced throughput of products and services; and the outcomes of increased product lifetimes on the right hand side (sustainable consumption through green growth (as a result of eco-efficiency initiatives), and recession (as a result of slower consumption).

Back to Session 2 Figure 4

 

Figure 2.9  Designer-maker, Amy Twigger Holroyd

Description

A picture of designer-maker Amy Twigger Holroyd.

Back to Session 3 Figure 1

 

Figure 2.10  ‘Keep and Share’ knitwear label

Description

The Keep and Share knitwear label.

Back to Session 3 Figure 2

 

Figure 2.11  Keep and Share knitwear

Description

Examples of Keep and Share knitwear – shown hanging together on a rack.

Back to Session 3 Figure 3

 

Figure 2.12  Keep and Share knitwear

Description

Examples of Keep and Share knitwear

Back to Session 3 Figure 4

 

Figure 2.13  (a) The Gladys Cardigan (b) A page from Amy’s design book

Description

As caption.

Back to Session 3 Figure 5

 

Figure 2.14  Riot and Return: a business service concept for leasing children’s knitwear

Description

Example of childen’s knitwear from the label Riot and Return.

Back to Session 3 Figure 6

 

Figure 2.15  The Keep and Share knitting tent

Description

The Keep and Share knitting tent at a festival, inviting different people to have a go at knitting.

Back to Session 3 Figure 7

 

Figure 2.16  Making activities and outcomes

Description

People sitting outside Amy’s tent knitting onto a long string of knitting, collectively constructed and hanging from a collection of chairs.

Back to Session 3 Figure 8

 

Figure 2.17  Adapting innovation – rebuilding technologies

Description

A consumer electronic product laid out on a workbench, dismantled to its core components.

Back to Session 4 Figure 1

 

Figure 2.18  Technology crafts: The multi-media lunchbox and the medi-meter

Description

Outcomes of adapting existing technologies for new purposes – shows the image of the multi-media lunchbox and the diagnostic medi-meter discussed in Video 2.7.

Back to Session 4 Figure 2

 

Video 2.1  Interview with Ramon Arratia

Transcript

RAMON ARRATIA:

Ramon Arratia, European Sustainability Director at Interface Flor. And our 2020 Vision is to eliminate all negative environmental impacts by the year 2020. This was set up in 1994. The interesting bit about Interface is that we set up this company challenge in 1994, before this whole carbon and climate-change hype. And this was our founder, Ray Anderson, realised about the opportunity and also the risks of businesses operating as they were. And he challenged internally all the employees to set up this challenge, and we believed in it.

It’s wider, it’s not only carbon. It goes about renewable energy or to reducing waste, about recycling products into new products. So it’s life after life. It goes to transport, but also those softer things about how to influence other stakeholders. That can be influencing your customers and trying to explain what are the product characteristics, so they can buy more of the products that have this impact. But also, it can be about the government and how you influence legislation, so they are tougher on environment. And also, you can protect your products through these actions as well, and your strategy.

And then the other thing is how you can reinvent the way you do business, which is our seventh front. And it’s about redesigning your commerce, and it’s about how you can translate products into service, and how you can have added-value services and expand to adjacent markets at the same time.

The main thing of product design which relates to sustainability is measurement. You need to have Life Cycle Analysis done for all your products to know where the impacts are. And that’s where you can take action. If you don’t have this phase solved, all the actions that you take can be meaningless, so that’s why we produce an LCA– Life Cycle Analysis– for every single product that we put on the market. And that tells us that most of the impact on our products is on the raw materials. 71% of the impact is on the raw materials, where our production is around 8%.

Transport is around 8%. Use and maintenance is about 6%, and that’s why we focus all our energy on product design to reduce the raw materials. And most of the impact is on the yarn of our products, and that’s why we really try to either reduce the amount of yarn or increase the amount of recycled content on the yarn. We came up with this concept of a product with 40% less yarn. It’s called microtufted product, which only Interface can produce. Our competitors haven’t been able to copy that.

We would like to see a company which in our direct footprint has all, 100% renewable energy. We would like to see zero waste. Everything that comes to us, in terms of raw materials, goes into the product. We would like to see that you can take an old product, separate the different components, and recycle each of those components into our product, because downcycling is, for us, counts as no recycling. So it has to be products with post-consumer waste from its old product. And we would like to see a very efficient transport, where now many companies look at road transport, and we are shifting from road to railway, to barges, to multimodal transportation.

Back to Session 1 MediaContent 1

 

Video 2.2  Keep and Share

Transcript

AMY TWIGGER HOLOROYD:

First became interested in sustainability when I was doing my MA, so that was about 10 years ago. I’d done a degree in fashion design and then specialised in knit wear for my MA. One of the principles that really appealed to me straight away was the idea of sufficiency and trying to get more satisfaction of need out of less material stuff. And so I was looking at how I could design garments that could be worn in different ways and might be kept for a long time.

So in terms of versatile pieces, I was trying to create knitted garments that could be worn by any person and worn in a whole range of ways– blanket-like pieces that had just one sort of anchor point. So this is my cuff in a blanket. It’s basically a big rectangle of knitting with one cuff at a corner, and you can wear it in different ways so versatile. So I like to wear it on my right arm and then wrap myself up in it and I can throw it over in different ways.

When I first came across the principles of design for sustainability, I was really interested in the difference between efficiency and sufficiency. So what was going on– the vast majority of what was going on at the time and still now I think– is all about efficiency, which I would, I suppose, characterise as business as usual but a little bit greener. And that tends to also be– things that are more efficient tend to also be cheaper, so that’s quite straightforward for business. I was interested in looking at sufficiency, which is a much bigger question about what we actually need.

Keep and Share is my craft fashion label. So I started it straight after my MA and it really built on the ideas that developed during that project.

The keeping is about longevity and getting more use out of garments by keeping them for longer. And the share is really about versatility. That can be directly about people sharing garments, so things that can be worn by people of different shapes, sizes, genders or by different people over time so that things could be handed down.

It’s also the idea of a garment sharing uses so that you could wear it in quite different contexts. So I had a customer once who bought a cardie, and she told me afterwards that she loved it, she wore it all the time. She could wear it to go to the theatre or she could wear it picking blackberries.

It seems sort of counterintuitive in a way to try and create a business and a growing business around encouraging people to buy less and to consume less. To be honest, it wasn’t really a practical problem because I was creating such a small scale business. But I was trying to set an example, but if it was scaled up, it would challenge quite a lot conventional ways of doing things.

Back to Session 3 MediaContent 1

 

Video 2.3  Design, process, people

Transcript

[MUSIC PLAYING]

AMY TWIGGER HOLROYD:

I have a very direct link with my customers. So I sell directly to individual people, and often have quite a lot of conversation and contact with them in the process of them acquiring an item of my knitwear. So this is a Gladys cardi. So, the same as I’m wearing. This is probably my signature piece, which I’ve made since about 2005.

Some of the secrets of it are that it’s seamlessly constructed. So sometimes when knitters look at it, they puzzle to figure out how it’s made. So I invisibly graft the centre back– the two sleeves are knitted separately– and then this is a sewn join that you can’t tell. And I used my techniques I’ve developed of joining pieces seamlessly during the knitting process. So this is a join, but it’s not sewn, and so it behaves as one really nice piece of fabric.

In a way, I feel like I’m designing, obviously, garments, but also very much trying to design how people feel about those garments, which is a bit of a weird thing to try and design, really. But from my own experience and from talking to so many people about how they feel about their clothes, people do have really strong emotions with garments. They’re very personal things. And I think a lot of the emotion often relates to kind of narratives and sense of stories. So I try to design in helping kind of stepping stones to that.

So this was from a collection where I named each of the pieces after women from my family tree. And this one was named after my nana, Gladys, who taught me to knit. I try to tell people about how I’ve made things, and where things are made, and to some extent kind of play up this nice idea of me knitting away in my studio in the countryside. It’s a nice story. I would that if I bought something that has a story from somebody else.

I also try to tell people about the story of where the ideas for that collection came from. I think that creates an ethos that I value. And I hope that the wearer will value their own narrative that they bring to the garment, as well. And that’s all part of what I’m trying to encourage and ultimately design.

It’s really nice that this one has become my best selling piece. Someone phoned me the other day having worn out– literally, actually worn out– one that she’d had for a few years because she wears it every single day. And that’s really satisfying, as a designer, to know that something has been used and worn.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

I think when I started– so when I started with these ideas when I was doing my MA– I only really had my own experience, as a wearer, to draw on. By having the opportunity to talk to people about how they like to live with their clothes gives me more perspectives to draw on and to understand how much my experience is common, but also things that might be different. For each collection that I design, I make one of these visual notebooks where I gather together ideas– images of different bits of inspiration that have kind of grabbed me.

For one collection– the collection that this book’s for– I asked my customers to send in bits of inspiration. So that was a really nice different way of doing things, and they responded really well to that. One customer is Spanish and she sent some images of some traditional pottery from the region of Spain that she’s from. And they translated really nicely to knit, so I worked for them and used them as inspiration, and then took that through into the development of the fabrics, creating this sort of geometric design– which is almost like eyes, I always think– and interpreting that in different colorways. The process of talking to people about what they want to wear and how they feel about it has– all of those conversations kind of build up into giving me a bigger picture of who my customers are and what they want and what it is about the slowness that I’m trying to offer– what it is about that that appeals to them.

So the way the business is going now is I’m moving much more to creating garments to commission for individual customers, and that’s items commissioned from my archive. So on my website, I now have an archive of over 120 designs that I’ve made in the past. So this piece is something that I’m making a commissioned version of at the moment.

So this customer has been hankering after this garment for a few years, and she’s kind of very nicely and slowly– that fits in with all my ideas– slowly come to the decision that she wants her own version of this. And she’s told me the colours that she wants, and the yarns and things. So I’m sourcing those yarns and sending them to her. So it’s quite a close conversation going on there. And I really like making things to commission and revisiting pieces from the archive, because I guess it shows that not just the garments I’m creating have a sense of longevity and slowness, but the whole business model, really, I have to have been going for 10 years or so to have this archive that I can work back into.

Back to Session 3 MediaContent 2

 

Video 2.4  Materials and sustainability

Transcript

AMY TWIGGER HOLROYD:

When I started the business, obviously, a big question was where I was going to get my materials from, and what I was going to use. The most important thing to me was that it was quality materials that would enable the garment to last for a long time. So because other people are so much just looking at efficiency and looking at maybe having a kind of slightly tick box approach to sustainability in terms of, oh, it’s organic, or it’s got a bit of recycled content or something, I focus much more on the bigger scale, I suppose– having quality materials that would last.

At that time– so this is about 10 years ago– a great restriction on that was really where I could get small enough quantities that were appropriate for the scale of business that I was working at. So I found an Italian spinner who was happy to sell to really small scale businesses, because there’s much more of that in Italy. Umm so I could buy, you know a few kilos of each colour, of each yarn.

So actually, I might have liked to also tick the organic boxes and have the bigger scale approach to what I was doing, but I was very much restricted by literally getting anything in scale that I wanted it. Things have changed now. There’s much more choice, I think.

This is my Amaranta cape that I’ve been making for several years in different yarns, different colours over time. This yarn is particularly beautiful to work with and to wear. So this is the only UK reared Kashmir. So most Kashmir, the fibre comes from the Far East.

This is fibre from a herd of goats in Devon, farmed by a very lovely farmer. And she can tell me all about where it’s processed and spun. And then it comes directly from her. She sends me pictures of the goats on the farm.

So this is an example of where there’s a really beautiful and very clear story from fibre to garment to the customer, because I pass that story on to the customer. And its beautifully soft. It’s really nice to wear.

I also make the same thing in other yarns. So this one is UK reared alpaca. So again, local and with a traceable story behind it.

And people feel like there’s a sense of value about them, as well. Kashmir and alpaca are thought of as valuable fibres, and I think that contributes to the desire and the intention to keep things for a long time– keep wearing them. The Kashmir, in particular, get softer and softer with time. And all of those things contribute to longevity, and therefore sufficiency, and then hopefully sustainability. I need to try and encourage the fact that the materials in the garments maintain their value over time, and perhaps even become more valuable emotionally– more almost treasured over time.

And so I’m trying to use materials that will age gracefully. Like we think about leather– a really nice, aged leather is nicer than a new leather. And so that’s what I aspire to. But also things that can be repaired, so when they do become degraded, they can be renewed in a way, and that means that the emotional value of the item can stay level or even, hopefully, increase.

Clothing is obviously produced and consumed within a really massive global system, which has enormous impact in terms of social issues– environmental issues. Clothing is quite a complex product to manufacture, and difficult to make ethical easily. 10 years ago when I was doing my MA, a lot of thinking was really very much still looking at manufacturing.

I think now we have moved on, and things have opened up quite a lot. And people are taking– some people are taking more of a systems view and a much more holistic view which encompasses people using things and their emotions and relationships with their garments. But there’s still, I think, too much emphasis on production and efficiency.

Back to Session 3 MediaContent 3

 

Video 2.5  Product to service

Transcript

AMY TWIGGER HOLROYD:

When I first started the business, I was really exploring these ideas of longevity and versatility through designing and making knitwear, and selling it to individual customers. As time went on and I had these conversations with customers, I found that one idea that I was really interested in exploring was how it’s actually possible to think about offering a service rather than always selling more and more and more stuff.

And the idea that I kind of developed was sort of children’s wear subscription service. I was designing and making knit wear for adults, and it makes sense to encourage people to keep things for a long time if they’re not a growing child. It didn’t– I quite liked the idea of doing children’s wear, but I didn’t feel I could sell things at the price point that my knitwear needs to be, because kids grow too fast and they literally wouldn’t get the wear out of it.

And so thinking about that issue and that problem and sustainable design ideas such as services rather than products got me thinking that it would be a really nice idea to hire garments from a library and sort of keep swapping them as the child grows. Obviously, the question of repair and maintenance is really important, so as things are worn– and the name is Riot and Return– the idea was that kids should be playing and having fun and ruining things really, but that they could be sort of cared for and regenerated when they came back into the library.

And so I was thinking about that as a designer how I could design things that could be easily repaired. If you’re a maker, then you’re good repairer as well because you use making knowledge in repair. And I quite like the idea that you would have pieces that started off the same but then as they aged and became damaged in different ways and then repaired in different ways, they would become more unique and more special.

And repair is also important in Keep and Share, so in the main knit wear label, in that I offer a repair service to customers. It’s quite nice. Occasionally, things come back in and I mend them for people and I can see how much they’ve been worn. That’s a really nice feeling.

Riot and Return was an idea that I explored and enjoyed developing the concept for, but it was pretty hard to run one business and to try and launch another one. Just as world economic conditions were becoming much more difficult, was just a step too far at that point.

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