Ecodesign Centre run first ECONetwork “Ideas Lounge”

Posted by: econetwork on: May 21, 2009

In: feasibility | Research | workshop
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The Ecodesign Centre ran it’s first “Ideas Lounge” as part of the ECONetwork feasibility study. The event was attended by a number of designers from Swansea, Cardiff, Mid-Wales. Unfortunately the North Wales people we invited were unable to attend due to time commitments. The flyer for the event can be downloaded here. The event was a success and it sets a good basis for future events towards developing an ecodesign network in Wales.

The agenda was:
16.00 – 16.10 : Introduction by Simon O’Rafferty
16.10 – 16.40 : Jonathan Crinion
16.40 – 17.10 : Rob Brown – Sprout Design
17.10 – 17.40 : Q&A – debate – challenge (take notes!)
17.40 – 18.30 : Food
18.30 – 20.00 : 60 minute design challenge

The event was introduced by Simon O’Rafferty. Presentation below.

Following this, there were two presentations from Jonathan Crinion and Rob Brown. These presentations set the context for the following discussions and workshop.

Jonathan’s presentation focussed on some of the insurmountable problems related to climate change, peak oil and resource depletion. By putting these issues in the context of design practice Jonathan was able to challenge everyone in the room in terms of personal perspectives, commercial expectations and potential social/political complacency. Jonathan’s perspective on the future of design mirrors a lot of the discussions stemming from the transition movement. food for thought indeed.

Image by Jonathan Crinion adapted from Transition Network / Transition Training

Following this, Rob Brown from Sprout design in London shared his experiences and the experiences of his agency in tackling the joint issues of sustainability and inclusive design. Rob put forward a strong case for making some of the complex issues of sustainability more tangible. By portraying an intelligent and design-led approach to sustainability, Rob managed to highlight the opportunities for agencies in Wales aswell as their clients.

After the discussions, Frank O’Connor facilitated a Q&A session with the audience. The questions from the audience reflected the depth of knowledge of the speakers. The questions ranged from the broad challenges for design policy, the potential for standards in ecodesign, the role of communications and eco-labels, the challenging of existing approaches such as cradle to cradle and very practical discussion on how design agencies in Wales can start tackling this issues now.

These discussions led into the later workshop. We decided to call this workshop the “60 minute design challenge”. While it didn’t set out to design anything the workshop allowed for a greater depth of discussion on what opportunities there are for a network in Wales, what the network could do and how it would operate. Some of the outputs from this workshop can be seen on the wordle and mindmap posted elsewhere in this blog.

Some images from the event (all photos by Mei – www.meilewis.com):