Cradle to Cradle October 20, 2006

William McDonough and Michael Braungart's recent book, Cradle to Cradle, has been popping up all over the office lately. It all started when Todd and Terri read it couple of months ago. The book is a manifesto for a new industrial paradigm, and has become required reading for everybody from business hot shots to environmental activists (we're guessing we fall somewhere in-between).

Among other things, the book has been a catalyst for office discussion about how we could recycle building products at the end of their life-cycle. Setting out to prove their theorem that a new kind of economy is not only viable, but profitable, Mr. McDonough and Mr. Braungart created McDonough Braungart Design Chemistry and the C2C Certification. Almost any product imaginable can gain C2C certification, from Wet Women Surf Wax to our new fleet of Herman Miller Caper side chairs.

 

Photography October 12, 2006

Collected below are 4 sets of provocative photographs from around the world.

Edward Burtynsky's photographs of the incredible scale of human manipulation of the landscape include stone quarries, ship-breaking, oil fields, and urban mines.

20 years after the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl the city of Pripyat remains an abandoned overgrown city. This collection of images is from a visitor's guided tour of the area around the reactor. (A simple google search locates several other photo galleries.)

Artist Jason Salavon layered photos of Homes for Sale in several large housing markets around the country.




The Face of Sydney is a project organized by the city of Sydney, Australia to compile a composite photo of the city's residents. 160,000 residents were photographed, from 9 months to 83 years old. Be sure to check out the neighborhood composites where smaller populations yield evidence of different skin tones and facial features.

 

100x100 October 03, 2006

Photographer Michael Wolf has compiled 100 photos of residents in their 100 square foot homes in Hong Kong's oldest public housing estate. The images are truly jaw-dropping in their simple portrayal of individual lives in the same tiny space.

Also on Michael's website are collections of other building types in China, including industrial architecture, corner houses, and architecture of density.

Wolf's compositions are particularly compelling for what they leave out. Earth and sky make only rare appearances, lending the architectural photography an almost palpable extra-terrestrial quality.