Sarah Rich, Founder, Longshot Magazine, Foodprint, Inhabitat

Gallery: Green Design Predictions For ...

Sarah Rich - Founder, Longshot Magazine, Foodprint Project, and Editor Emeritus at Inhabitat

I think we're going to continue to see a lot of innovation in mobile technology and apps that improve our efficiency at home, provide data to make us more informed consumers, and make it possible to further dematerialize our lives without sacrificing much. I also think we're going to see more and more fruitful design collaborations (and collaborations of all kinds) leveraged through Twitter and other social media.

These things help us at an individual level. What we still need are systems changes, from governments and corporations, that automatically orient individual actions toward sustainability. We need leadership at the highest levels to establish structures within which our everyday choices naturally lead to better outcomes. Otherwise the insane weather and snarled air travel that we've all just suffered through will continue and worsen.

So here's to construction collaboration and real leadership in 2011!

8 Comments

Starre Vartan January 4, 2011 at 11:35 pm

I’ve been watching designers pushing the boundaries in green- and putting sustainable ideas front and center to the public for the past decade that I’ve been reporting on environmental issues. Keep going guys!! It’s working
greenstreetinc January 4, 2011 at 4:30 pm

It’s so inspiring to see green design continuing to become more than just a ‘passing’ interest – especially in New York. Great Article and looking forward to helping NY become ‘greener’ in 2011!
davidbrodeur January 4, 2011 at 1:51 pm

Some great predictions! Really enjoyed the contributions – especially the ones from Sarah and Bridgette.
Andrew Michler January 4, 2011 at 1:44 pm

What a great group of voices. I would have to agree with Kira Gould that the thinking professionals in the environmental disciplines will have to take charge rather than counting on a short term thinking political class. If we create undeniably superior designs and systems then the political process will have no choice but to support it.
kestrel January 4, 2011 at 1:43 pm

Inhabitat…always keeping my optimistic for the future of green design.
Jessica Dailey January 4, 2011 at 1:30 pm

I completely agree with Bridgette’s prediction that 2011 will be the year of green renovations. We’re already starting to see this with the multiple passive house retrofits taking place in NYC!
Jasmin Malik Chua January 4, 2011 at 1:25 pm

Let’s hope that “green design” becomes redundant in 2011!
Erik van Lennep January 2, 2011 at 5:47 am

My own predictions for 2011 were recently posted on my blog, in a summary of the emerging Living Economy. I summarized a few of the game-changing frameworks, and linked to a number of useful documents. Everyone welcome in that discussion:)”The Shift Hits the Fan”, on erikvanlennep(dot) com. Really, this isn’t an egregious self-promotion. Really.