Part 3
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During her environmental-literature search, Lyons came across the name
of William McDonough in two places. She read the March 1993 issue of Interiors[7] magazine, which was dedicated
entirely to McDonough and his projects. She had also seen an article about him in the
Wall Street Journal.[8] McDonough had just accepted a job
as the dean of Architecture at the University of Virginia.
After reading about him, Lyons viewed him as the most high-profile person working
with environmental concerns in the design industry.
McDonough had no immediate plans to develop sustainable fabrics,
but he responded quite enthusiastically when she made the suggestion to him. He was
looking for opportunities to apply his design philosophy. The fabric
design project fit into his plans perfectly.
McDonough came to visit DesignTex in early October 1993. During their
meeting, Lyons described the options she had turned up in her literature and
marketplace searches and suggested the PET soda pop bottle fabric idea to him.
In turn, McDonough presented his design philosophy (the elements of this philosophy
are outlined in Exhibit 3.
"Two key principles hit home really hard,"
Lyons said,
"the idea that waste equals food and the idea of a cradle-to-cradle design,
not a
cradle-to-grave design.". McDonough stated that in order to meet the waste equals food and
cradle-to-cradle design criteria, the product had to be able either
(1) to compost completely with no negative environmental impact, thereby becoming food
for other organisms (organic nutrients)
or (2) to become raw material for another industrial product (technical nutrients).
Furthermore, one should not mix the organic and the technical, or one would end up with
a product that could be used neither as food for organisms nor raw materials for technology.
"The product should be manufactured without the release of
carcinogens, bioacumulatives, persistent toxic chemicals,
mutagens, heavy metals, or endocrine disruptors." McDonough discouraged
the use of the term "environmentally friendly" and instead
proposed "environmentally intelligent" to describe this method of
design, because it involved having the foresight to know that poisoning the
earth is not merely unfriendly, but unintelligent.[9]
"The key to the project", McDonough stated, "was getting the fabric mills to
open up their manufacturing processes to inspection to see where problems arise."
In addition, the mills would have to examine the processes of the mill partners--
the farmers, yarn spinners, twisters, dyers, and finishers-- so that they could
also meet the design protocol. McDonough suggested that his close colleague, Dr.
Michael Braungart of the Environmental Protection Encouragement Agency (EPEA) in Germany,
could help with this project. Braungart's profession was chemistry, and he had led the
chemistry department at Greenpeace. He had collaborated before with McDonough in
implementing McDonough's design protocols.
In addition to the environmental criteria, McDonough's proposal addressed the
aesthetic component of the fabrics. "The fabrics needed to be incredibly
beautiful as well." He suggested that they use the mathematics of fractals to
generate the patterns. Fractals were appealing to McDonough, because "they are
like natural systems... the smallest component is the same as the whole." He was
interested in natural harmonic proportions throughout nature, and he felt that
the designs should reflect the natural harmony in the protocols and in the
aesthetics.
Go on to Part 4