The Green Bridge Project

Brian Bjerketvedt of Design Furnace in Minneapolis needs your help. Or, more precisely your photograph. He's volunteered to create a poster for The Green Bridge project which will feature a huge collection of faces to make the point that all of us need to get behind initiatives to get our buildings to be much less wasteful. Europe is leading the way which shouldn't sit well with us competitive Americans. This effort which has taken hold in the area of commercial and civic buildings is starting to move into residential architecture. Good news for those of us in cold climates because the resulting designs are not only really beautiful but much warmer in winter!


+ What you can do
Send a photograph of yourself and a few words of encouragement to brian@design-furnace.com

Learn more about the growing green, carbon neutral and zero emission movement. The US Green Building Council is a good place to start or Google LEED certification.

+ Deadline
April 20, 2007

Inhabitat T-shirt Design Contest

Inhabitat a site devoted to "future-forward design for the world you inhabit" is a great source of information and inspiration about a smarter and more sustainable world through thoughtful design. They are holding a t-shirt design contest so now is your chance to make your mark among the cognoscenti of the green design movement.

+ Deadline
April 20, 2007. The guidelines are simple in an effort to encourage a wide variety of interpretations.

Architecture for Humanity

Architecture for Humanity is a really amazing organization of volunteers who are building some innovative and successful projects around the world in response to global, social and humanitarian crises. The important word there is "building" not just talking about. This organization has local chapters the world over, is very active and led by a really incredible guy by the name of Cameron Sinclair.

They recently held a logo contest in which I participated that received 811 entries. Proof of two things. They value a meaningful identity and graphic designers want to use their skills for the forces of good. AFH used Flickr to post all entries and openly critique the finalists. This was an interesting view into the process. If, like me, you work in advertising you may not see the view from the moral high ground all that often. It can be difficult to make a permanent move up the hill but try contacting a local group for a visit. You never know where the adventure might lead.