Design 21: Social Design Network

Calling design students to use their creative thinking skills to address the global fresh water crisis, the AIGA, INDEX, Circle of Blue and New York design firm Collins have collaborated to launch the first annual Aspen Design Challenge, 'Designing Water's Future'.

Deborah Szebeko, Founding Director of Thinkpublic has been shortlisted for the British Council’s UK Young Design Entrepreneur Award 08.

Illustrating the power and potential of using design thinking to tackle some of the UK's greatest social issues Deborah and the team at Thinkpublic have helped make significant improvements to communications and patient experiences in the NHS.

"We are faced with a growing amount of social challenges, including an ageing population, social exclusion and global warming to name a few. Designers need to adapt their skills to play a role in helping solving these challenges. Not by designing posters or products, but by using their skills to involve people and communities in the problem solving process. Together we can understand how we can solve these big issues and design sustainable, useful and usable solutions that work in different households, communities, regions and counties." - Deborah Szebeko.

Alongside 5 other UK entrepreneurs Deborah has been shortlisted to the top six finalists. The winner will be announced at 100% Design, on 19th September 2008.

Frank Chimero's inspirational design posters are now for sale!

One of the perks of having a profession where you make things, is that you can pretty much make your own version of anything to cater specifically to you and your peers. I think this is what has happened with designers: we need our own version of everything and want to be our own audience. I decided to embark on creating some "inspirational" posters aimed specifically at designers. The topics range from various truisms I've discovered about the field in the past few years to snarky tongue-in-cheek comments. I think we designers spend an awful lot of time talking to ourselves, and I consider this my contribution to the monologue." - Frank Chimero.

You can buy the posters here. It would be good to know if the profits are going to a social cause mind.

The Service Design Network [SDN] is organising a Service Design Conference in Amsterdam on the 24th-26th of November 2008.

For more information, visit the ServiceDesignNetwork.

The New Orleans 100 is a worldwide initiative founded by AllDayBuffet that hopes to highlight and encourage discussion among millions about 100 of the most innovative and world-changing ideas to take root in the city since Katrina.

To combat top down media during the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, AllDayBuffet hope to leverage bottom up tools on the social web (email, blogs, twitter, facebook, digg, etc.), which can reach a combined audience of millions to raise awareness about New Orleans and inspire action to make a difference.

A list will be released on Monday, August 25th - the week of the Hurricane Katrina anniversary. The goal is to reach 1,000,000 pageviews by 8/29/08. So, sign up to the Newsletter and you'll get an email on Monday, August 25th of 100 world changing ideas.

I am interested to see how this develops, if the challenge is met and what projects arrive in the inbox!

• The New Orleans 100

If you have not heard already - IDEO have launched a brand new website!

I am very impressed and consistently inspired, I am yet to exhaust all the information within the site - worth a look!

• IDEO.com
• Via NotCot.org

Since a previous D21 post, I have been helping Simon Berry (CEO, ruralnet|uk) promote his latest idea, and what an idea it is! ColaLife.org is a campaign aiming to leverage Coca Cola’s distribution muscle to distribute life saving medicines to children in developing countries.

The idea is simple, but until now has been difficult to evolve. The power of web 2.0 and social networking media however, has allowed Simon to digitally document his progress and to build a digital support network to develop the campaign.

“We can distribute Coca Cola all around the World but we can’t seem to get medication to save a child from something as simple as diarrhea and I think that that is wrong.” (Annie Lennox, 2008)

Since the launch of the campaign and due to the power of a Facebook group, Simon was invited by Salvatore Gabola, Coca-Cola’s Global Head of Stakeholder Relations, to a meeting to discuss the idea further at Coca-Cola’s European HQ in Brussels. The campaign’s Facebook group has reached over 4,441 members since its inception on 18 May 2008. It was nominated for the NewStatesman’s New Media Award in June and showcased at London’s 2gether08 festival on 3 July.

Most recently, the campaign was featured on BBC Radio 4’s iPM programme in May and July, and on the BBC World Service on 13 July. Simon explains; “Before the Facebook group I was getting nowhere at all. The group has changed everything and is the reason we’ve made such rapid progress …Continuing support ...

Last week, in a focused search through Flickr for humanitarian related photography, I discovered the unique works of Polish born Maciej Dakowicz.

For the third issue of the inspiring NEED Magazine, Dakowicz has visually captured a story about HOPE organization helping children in Kolkata, India.

Dakowicz currently lives in Cardiff, completing a PhD in computing and freelancing as a photographer. Do take a moment to explore his work at MaciejDakowicz.com

All images copyright of Maciej Dakowicz.

In partnership with The Rockefeller Foundation, IDEO were commissioned to undertake research into new avenues for social change, and design's role in the social sector. The result - a resourceful How-To-Guide and Workbook aptly entitled, Design For Social Impact.

"The consistent message has been YES. Yes, design thinking has a lot to offer, and many of our potential partners are very excited to see us become more engaged. The challenge is how. How can design firms make social impact work a core part of their business? How can we collaborate with organizations that are highly resource constrained? How can we redesign our offerings to become more accessible to social sector organizations? This initiative is focused on the process around doing this work, rather than the content of the work itself." - (IDEO. 2008. Design for Social Impact, p.5.)

• Design For Social Impact

Feature originally written for Inhabitat.com

Last month 18 of the world’s leading photographers were shortlisted for the Prix Pictet, the first photography award dedicated to sustainability. Can a photograph really help to sustain the planet? According to The Prix Pictet, “It depends on the photograph.”

The contest mobilizes the medium of photography to bring the message of sustainability to the public. At its 2008 launch in London, Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland (Special Envoy on Climate Change to the Secretary-General of the United Nations), explained that “The Prix Pictet offers photographers the opportunity to influence change for the good of sustainability.”

Each year the Prix Pictet will focus on a specific sustainability theme and award 100,000 Swiss francs to the photographer who best represents its critical story. The theme for 2008 is water, the world’s most precious resource.

“There has been much talk about climate change. But not much about where we will see its first impact: water. Flooding. Drought. Contamination. Water is the vector of climate change. By 2010 an estimated 40 per cent of the world’s poorest people will lack access to clean water. Two hundred million may be physically or economically displaced. This is not the future. This is now.”

Judges selected their shortlist from 200 nominees hailing from 43 countries. Among the 18 finalists are some of our favorite eco artists like Edward Burtynsky, David Maisel, Chris Jordan, Reza Deghati...