sustainable style foundation*

Just when you think green roofs are catching on, an innovative architect gives us green walls. Mass Studies' principle Minsuk Cho recently designed Belgian fashion designer Ann Demeulemeester's new store in Seoul with forests, ferns and lizards in mind. The latest of six projects that incorporate living surfaces, Cho feels this is his best yet.

Are you ready to be a world class eco-designer? Now's your chance to be featured on Treehugger, Inhabitat, Western Interiors, and in a variety of other press outlest. The Sustainable Furniture Council and World Market Center have combined forces to sponsor a design competition "One Good Chair". Designers are invited to contribute their vision for a new kind of eco-chair, one that focuses first and foremost on form, that minimizes resources while maximizing comfort and enjoyment, that truly combines great design with ecology and ergonomics. Designs should demonstrate a new attitude toward an old problem. A cash prize of $4,500 will be awarded to a designer or design team (of 2-5 designers). If all goes well, the award is intended to support the fabrication of a prototype of the winning design. Registration ends May 16, entries are due June 9 and the awards will take place Las Vegas Market, July 30. Check the website for more details.

The latest addition to the eco-fashion show frenzy occured in Cracow on January 26th. With the Cracow School of Art and Fashion Design (Szkola Artystyczego Projektowania Ubioru) educating students in creating innovating eco-fashion clothing made of recycled materials-paper and plastic, its no surprise all eyes were on Polish designers for their interpretation of the global trend. Over 300 garments were presented during the show titled "Recykling Multiplikacje". The show was also an opening event of the international competition for young designers createeurope.com's The Fashion Academy Award.

Images by Pawel Kaminski

Boost Mobile recently created their Boosted campaign, essentially a lifestyle brand infused with art, music, and pop culture. What makes things different is they partnered with designers to produce a line of accessories and other devices that captures the essence of the today's mobile and youth lifestyles while highlighting people and planet issues. A great example is one of their first partnerships with Livity Outernational. The accessories pictured to the left are just such an example...100% organic cotton and great design. You can find these and other Boost x Livity merch at our alter-ego site www.sustainable-style.org. More 'Boosted' Partnerships to come soon so stay tuned...

Gradon over at Design Boston has put together an awesome list of scholarships for interior design students. IFDA, ASID, and IIDA are all there and as Gradon points out, there aren't many folks applying for them. As they say in Vegas...them's good numbers.

New Orleans natives Harry Connick, Jr. and Bradford Marsalis recently teamed up with the New Orleans Habitat for Humanity to create Musicians' Village, a community that will both provide housing to NOLA musicians affected by Katrina, as well as a focal point for teaching, sharing and preserving the rich musical tradition of the city. The project also includes the new Ellis Marsalis Center. From the website..."Another important innovation in the Musicians’ Village effort is the inclusion of the Ellis Marsalis Center for Music, named in honor of the New Orleans native and legendary jazz pianist, educator and patriarch of the Marsalis clan. Focusing on the ethnically and culturally diverse musical heritage of the city, the Center will include a 150-seat performance space with state-of-the-art lighting and sound. The Center will also support the growth of emerging New Orleans talent and music by providing classrooms, technical and administrative support, and producing the accomplishments of its students. These facilities will be available for residents of Musicians’ Village as well as artists and students citywide." From horns to hammers, here's to sweat harmonies in the 9th Ward!

I (Sean here) was the proud recipient of a Make It Right (MIR) Caputo Cap this holiday season. Made with eco-friendly materials, proceeds from the hat will help build sustainable homes in New Orleans. Brad Pitt has been doing a lot down in NOLA given his sustainable housing work with Global Green and all so I wasn't surprised to find him behind Make it Right and its Pink Project. The very hip hat is sold out now but there are still quite a few items for you environistas out there including another cap, t-shirts, and cool totebags made from recycled Pink Project materials.

Titan TV, an internet broadcast network, has a great lineup of environmental casts and resources. In their channel Titan Greens, Liza de Guia is their green go-to girl and hosts a lot of the clips under the 'Daily Greens' Title. Her most recent offering "Green Resolutions 2008" interviews folks at the NY Greendrinks Holiday Party and is quite entertaining. Lots more from Liza and other environmental content is available from Titan's main page above. Looks like Liza may be the next rockstar in environmental journalism.

We just came across this very cool website, Urban Reinventors. Great look and feel plus lots of great articles on the ideas of urbanism...both positive and negative. There are beautiful images, innovative ideas, and lots of other materials on the topic, both artistic and academic. The site was recently reworked and their second issue of their online magazine adds a lot more to the mix as well.

(Pier Paolo - Torino, Italia) The recent appointment of Seoul as World Design Capital in 2010 could be interpreted in two different ways at least. From one hand we could read the attempt to free South Korea from the stereotyped image of the ICT Nation above all. On the other hand we could consider the effort to include a lot of design Korean actions under the same umbrella named Design. In short, the attempt to boost quality and exports of Korean car district well represented by companies such as Hyundai, Kia or Daewoo, considered worldwide as the second regional business segment after IT (with two Korean pillars: Samsung and LG). And giving authoritativeness to international events such as Design Korea, founded in 2003 and now arrived at the third appointment. This event (International conference, exhibition and so on) very attractive for the international design community, has the cultural objective to put together ideas, design policies, associations, institutions, designers, critics and students. And they do it very well under the coordination of KIDP (Korean Institute of Design Promotion), the real motor of all these events.

Therefore the mayor of Seoul, Oh Se-Hoon, last October (when the city was named World Design Capital 2010) mentioned the so call “miracle on the Han river”. This is the period between Sixties and Seventies in which there was an extraordinary and rapid economic and industrial growth in Seoul, the city in which the river Han flows. So Seoul triumphed over cities such as Dubai, Singapore and Toronto and it is really worthy of this appointment beacuse of all the efforts to support a real international culture of industrial design at different levels. The Korean city and its area (which has about 20 million of inhabitants) will be for one year backstage and background of the design events. However my feeling is that Seoul is already an ICT and design international capital.

It seems that WDC nomination is going to move rapidly from cities that consider design as an instrument for transformation and social-economic change (this condition seemed to be really important at the beginning of the award WDC), to capitals already known as design or ICT cities.

In short, from an award to virtuous cities with their processes of transformations to an award to industrial districts and companies. Of course this nomination is a positive message for European cities such as Barcelona, London, Milan, they will have more chances to get this award. What about other fizzy and interesting cities such as Valencia or Gwangju?

(picture by Sergio Corsaro)

(Pier Paolo - Torino, Italia) - Apologizing for my basic English I am starting blogging today, first post, first pictures, of course from Torino, the city where I live. A special thank to Sean who invited me to join SSF, I am really proud to do this. Why blogging from Torino? First because the city has been changing a lot for 5-6 years, when was appointed to be Winter Olympic Games in 2006. After the Games, the city has continued to enhance its development and now we are approaching the Year of Design. Torino has been changing very rapidly from One company Town (Fiat Group Automobiles) to a city of services, of culture, of creativity, arts and sports. And the city today shows all the signs of this profound transformation.

Now we are awaiting 2011 when we will be celebrating the 150th anniversary of the Unification of Italy. In the meantime the city will be the first World Design Capital for one year, a leading project of the International Design Alliance (IDA), currently managed by the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design (ICSID). Twelve months of events, exibitions in Torino and in the entire region to offer a clear vision on the design culture in Piedmont. A design approach that sometimes seems bold and multi-faceted, other times hidden, anyway almost always high level projects.

The real commencement of the World Design events was fixed for the New Year’s Eve of Design, December 31, 2007. After that the programme will tie up with the well established calendar of fairs, exhibitions and festivals that take place in the city’s major venues all through the year. For instance in October the main subject will be design and food, to coincide with the Taste Fair and Terra Madre World Food Meeting edited by Slow Food movement. In November the focus will be on the relationship between art, media and industrial design (Torino Art Fair and Torino Film Festival) and before the summer period two important appointments: “Changing the Change: Design Visions, Proposals and Tools”: this is the title of a conference that will be held on July 10-12, 2008 at the Politecnico di Torino in the framework of Torino 2008 World Design Capital. It will highligt new visions in the field of sustainability and outline the state of the art of ecodesign research. The second event is the 23rd International Union of Architects World Congress that will bring to Torino the International community of architects, planners and designers (June 29-July 3). Green will be the colour of the visual communication of the Year of Design. Why green? First because green represents the combination of the two “corporate” colours of Torino: blue and yellow.Second because it occupies a central position on the scale of human visual perception, it is the colour of reason and of course also the one of sustainable design (green design, eco-design, systems design).

Last but not least I want to mention the Luci d’Artista works and installations. It is a real art gallery en plein air set in streets and squares of Torino from November to February. It has become one of the symbols of the city for 10 years. The 2007 edition includes 19 installations with the well known works of Rebecca Horn, Nicola De Maria and Mario Merz (who used the first Fibonacci numbers written with red neon on one side of the Mole Antonelliana four-faced dome).

Torino, Italia (Pier Paolo) - Apologizing for my basic English I am starting blogging today, first post, first pictures, of course from Torino, the city where I live. A special thank to Sean who invited me to join SSF, I am really proud to do this. Why blogging from Torino? First because the city has been changing a lot for 5-6 years, when was appointed to be Winter Olympic Games in 2006. After the Games, the city has continued to enhance its development and now we are approaching the Year of Design. Torino has been changing very rapidly from One company Town (Fiat Group Automobiles) to a city of services, of culture, of creativity, arts and sports. And the city today shows all the signs of this profound transformation.

Now we are awaiting 2011 when we will be celebrating the 150th anniversary of the Unification of Italy. In the meantime the city will be the first World Design Capital for one year, a leading project of the International Design Alliance (IDA), currently managed by the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design (ICSID). Twelve months of events, exibitions in Torino and in the entire region to offer a clear vision on the design culture in Piedmont. A design approach that sometimes seems bold and multi-faceted, other times hidden, anyway almost always high level projects.

The real commencement of the World Design events was fixed for the New Year’s Eve of Design, December 31, 2007. After that the programme will tie up with the well established calendar of fairs, exhibitions and festivals that take place in the city’s major venues all through the year. For instance in October the main subject will be design and food, to coincide with the Taste Fair and Terra Madre World Food Meeting edited by Slow Food movement. In November the focus will be on the relationship between art, media and industrial design (Torino Art Fair and Torino Film Festival) and before the summer period two important appointments: “Changing the Change: Design Visions, Proposals and Tools”: this is the title of a conference that will be held on July 10-12, 2008 at the Politecnico di Torino in the framework of Torino 2008 World Design Capital. It will highligt new visions in the field of sustainability and outline the state of the art of ecodesign research. The second event is the 23rd International Union of Architects World Congress that will bring to Torino the International community of architects, planners and designers (June 29-July 3). Green will be the colour of the visual communication of the Year of Design. Why green? First because green represents the combination of the two “corporate” colours of Torino: blue and yellow.Second because it occupies a central position on the scale of human visual perception, it is the colour of reason and of course also the one of sustainable design (green design, eco-design, systems design).

Last but not least I want to mention the Luci d’Artista works and installations. It is a real art gallery en plein air set in streets and squares of Torino from November to February. It has become one of the symbols of the city for 10 years. The 2007 edition includes 19 installations with the well known works of Rebecca Horn, Nicola De Maria and Mario Merz (who used the first Fibonacci numbers written with red neon on one side of the Mole Antonelliana four-faced dome).

I attended the International Sustainability Institute's Trash Fashion Bash tonight and must say that I was totally blown away by the amount and quality of the designs. Many of the designs were from the fabulous design divas at Haute Trash but there were many local designers that wowed the crowd too, from a tofu packaging wedding gown by Chaco to women's business suit made from circuit boards. And then there were the models! Several SSF favorites including Lynne Baker (pictured at left) part of the City of Seattle's green building team (and frequent SSF OSSA Award judge), Diane Sugimura, Director of Planning & Develolpment for the city of Seattle, Joanie Parsons of Parsons Public Relations, Kaye Smith-Blum of Butch Blum who was one of the evenings MCs. There were many other architects, urban planners, and even several budding high schoolers striking a pose for sustainability as well. Any why did the models look so fabulous you ask, well, becuase SSF Co-founder and Senior Stylist Rebecca Luke was on the scene in wearing her les Egoistes hat training all those high-profile sustainability celebs how to strike a pose on the runway of course. All in all, another great example of how we all can look fabulous, live well, and do good.

From time to time, we here at SSF like to do a little web search on our favorite keword term, "sustainable style". Since we coined the term back in 2003 it seems to be popping up all over the place. For our first stop on our round the world tour we highlight one our absolutely favorite sustainable style web spots, the Fliker: sustainable style group page. Really, some of the coolest creations around, from fashion to furniture and more. Best of all, it's a thriving online posse with all sorts of great ideas on how to make more sustainable personal lifestyle choices. Who's behind this sassy cyber community? None other than fiftyrx3's Jill Danyelle. Keep up the good work y'all!

Carmaker Scion's independent film series Route has produced some pretty amazing films. One that is currently touring the US is Bling: A Planet Rock by award-winning New York based documentary filmaker Raquel Capeda. Bling connects the world of hip hop with the blood diamond associated civil war in Sierra Leon and does so with no holds barred. Three hip hop celebs - Raekwon (Wu Tang Klan), Paul Wall and Reggaetón king, Tego Calderon - head back to the country to check out the current state of affairs. The Scion tour is almost up, but keep an eye for it to make the rounds on its own.