Branding and Sustainability: todays sustainable stores examples, why have we taken so long?

For my final post I wanted to speak about green design and sustainability, it is embarrassing to say it, but back in my country things like recycling, or sustainable stores are just beginning, we don’t have things such as blue boxes, charges for plastic bags at supermarkets, different trash containers, or others. Maybe you could see a few recycling programs in the most accommodate neighborhoods in the capital of Chile , Santiago,  and a few malls that provide different trash containers for post recycling but that it´s pretty much everything.  For this reason it was a huge impact to know that recycling issues ,concerns, and their integration into design matters began around 1980, because for my experience in Chile this type of matters have only been an issue since maybe a decade ago.

We may not have all of this but something that it is present ,and more every day, is the sustainable branding , and by this I mean stores that reflect sustainable concerns, or products that involve recycling  and sustainable production in their line.

This lead me to a question because green design has been present in the first world countries since the 80’s but even though brands have been taking care of those issues, I feel that just now the involvement of green design is being taken in the big picture. Sustainable stores, 100% organic cotton clothes, even jeans produced from plastic and with less amount of water. I wanted to repeat what I called the “google experiment” making a strict search to prove that what I was thinking about , and by this I mean that interior design of stores based on green ideals, have had a huge growth in the last decade.

This is what I typed “opens new sustainable store”, I didn’t want to type a specific area such as clothing, furnishing,  electronics or other, and also I didn’t want to type a specific location.

The firs result I got was from  October of 2013, really recent,  the country : United kingdom, and the brand Sainsbury´s (to be honest I had to do a little research because I didn’t even knew what type of store was ) renowned supermarket store  one of the largest in the UK. In their design their proposal was to make a zero waste to landfill and  zero carbon emissions, also materials such as “hybrid glued laminated timber and steel structural frame” helped reducing the carbon print, …100 prismatic roof lights reducing the need of electrical light and  a biogas generator to provide both heat and electricity.”

The second result was from Puma , in august of 2012, in this case was the first  Puma worldwide   fully sustainable store , located in India, country we all know for being one of the biggest manufacturers for international brands.

“In keeping with our mission of becoming the most desirable and sustainable Sportlifestyle company PUMA is happy to take this pioneering step forward for the retail industry”said Franz Koch , CEO of PUMA. “ Establishing a sustainable PUMA store underlines our commitment to reduce CO2 emissions, energy, water and waste in PUMA offices, stores, warehouses and direct supplier factories by 2015”

The store features recycled steel from old DVD players, 90% of direct access for natural light, 100% solar powered , recycled wood  for furniture and low VOC (voltaic organic compound ) paint, occupancy sensors, and a green roof.

Finally the 3^rd result was from Levi´s from July of 2013 also, in this case  located in the U.S. specifically in San Francisco.  This store  used 79%  of the demolition materials  of the original construction and used them in the reconstruction, as well as only recycled wood . The store as also a LEED gold certificate and 90% of their equipment is energy efficient. Finally their concept for this store also reaches their product, selling jeans that are produced with the minimum amount of plastic bottles achieved  with only 8 of them on each jeans.

After reading about this 3 cases, indeed this last decade have showed huge advances in the design of sustainable stores, brands that are taking that extra step and reaching not only sustainable and green products , but also are introducing green design into their stores and company identity, the question about why this hasn’t been done previously has one clear answer, technological  development, technology that had allowed creating systems such as the  one in the Puma store that enable to have air conditioning from the earth itself, or as the photovoltaic roofs in Sainsbury´s  or the recycling of old construction materials for the rebuilt of new locations as the Levis case.

This has really made me want to research even more, technology only goes faster, and I personally think in not a faraway future , examples like this , hopefully, will become everyday components in architecture and design.

F!

Sources:

http://www.designweek.co.uk/news/sainsburys-trials-new-sustainable-store-concept/3037365.article

http://blacktansa.blogspot.ca/2011/12/is-sustainable-retail-design-missing.html

http://about.puma.com/puma-opens-first-sustainable-puma-store/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=8NqHaMzO9QQ

http://greenlichen.com/2012/09/puma-sustainable-store-in-bangalore-is-cool-and-energy-efficient-video/

http://www.kering.com/sites/default/files/dd4-puma-store-bangalore-magasin-int.jpg

http://www.kering.com/en/sustainability/achievements/sustainable_puma_store

http://www.sfgate.com/style/article/Levi-s-sews-sustainability-into-brand-from-ground-4738823.php#photo-5018844

http://www.rawrdenim.com/2013/08/levis-san-francisco-flagship-location-launch/

No aesthetic goals, Postmodernism and Studio Alchimia

We are almost finishing the school year,  during one of our last classes we were learning about post modernism and the Italian avant garde, and a phrase catch my attention “ in a global, pluralist culture, there were no agreed aesthetic goals” . Postmodernism was all about the psychological relation of people with design and architecture, we saw a few examples of symbolism in architecture, and also the re integration of old movements to regain the connection lost with modernism , we started seeing a lot of mixtures of styles, almost like they had used everything they could and integrated it to design and architecture with the only purpose of remembering and regaining that connection and  although the intention in the representation of this was totally achieved , aesthetic standards where put aside.

Aesthetic, “good taste”, good design, standards, all where associated with modernism and when the movement died people see those terms with disgust, but why? I personally think that design must have certain parameters, if not designs becomes art, not that art is bad, but good design must appeal to people, must provoke people to “want it”, the desire, while art in my opinion has one and only finality :expression,  either  of opinions  feelings, and others. Both can be related but they do not have  the same goal.

Following this we came to the Italian avant garde, and what did they want ? : Exactly the opposite, they did not want to be related with aesthetics, standards, materials, or anything they wanted freedom to express and create. During finals of 1960 and the 1970’s different groups where formed, Archizoom, Superstudio , UFO, and finally the one that caught my eye Studio Alchimia.

There I was sitting on my desk watching the slides of the presentation, one after the other it just didn’t make sense. It  reached the point where I was so confused that I didn’t even know what was my opinion about it. Founded by the distinguished Italian designer and architect Alessandro Mendinni in 1976, colours, patterns, forms, and creativity where terms related to it, but something was mentioned about it during class, Studio Alchimia never reached commercial success.

Then I went back to the phrase in class “ In a global, pluralist culture, there were no agreed aesthetic goals” … So if supposedly  there were no aesthetic goals then why Studio Alchimia didn’t reached success? . I think there is a need for aesthetic goals, a guidance, to follow a line; for example in materials, they mixed a lot of inexpensive with expensive materials, which at the same time made their designs unreachable for most people. They clearly were following the principle   of no aesthetics but they didn’t reach success because it didn’t appeal to people, in the way of desire( the look of it) and closeness , instead it did made a huge impact on the world of design because of the power of representation and uniqueness of each piece, yet again it was so far from what people would want for their homes that passed exactly from being design to art pieces.

I found a few pictures online that represent this opinion

In both of this we see a cabinet and a book case respectively, but do they look like them? Which is the aesthetics of them?, why do they look like sculptures? Why is the bookcase without books or the cabinet without objects on its shelves?. The answer is that there is simply not an specific  aesthetic, no taste standard, just pure  design process and experimentation, creativity was there main goal and they achieved this with great success, design without judgments according to some, but I don’t think that actually exist, in fact this may be another of the factors related to their pour commercial success. Judgment is always present, present in this post, and present in the people that will read this and have their own opinion, like the one that I am expressing right now .the Alchimia group didn’t follow any standards, it was pure expression and for me that is more close to art than design. I wouldn’t use this pieces for what they were design for, I would not put books, or objects instead I would exhibit them. And that right there is a judgment already.

F!

Sources:

http://www.architonic.com/dcsht/factotum-bookcase-sotheby-s/4103811

http://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/7945888

Deconstruction and Brutalism, versus or evolution in expression against modernism.

I am already in chapter 8 of my book, Interior design since 1900 by Anne Massey, and while I was reading about post modernism and movements that where developed during that time (around 1980´s) a picture of the Deconstruction Movement caught my eye

Post-modernist movements where all about being against modernism and their clean lines, really square in a way, all planned, and with no emotions (like critics to that movement described in that time). Seeing this image make me  think and realize that Deconstructivism was not following the path of recovering past styles, and mixing them all in one space, they didn’t want to represent this pluralism in styles; instead they wanted to show the chaos, a chaos produced by the lack of emotional link with spaces. In this picture I see reflected different paths and when you see the mix of the stairs, ramps and windows, I think that is exactly the feeling of the time, people simply didn’t know where to go from modernism, what where they supposed to do after experienced such a clean , simple and stiff (in a way) movement.  You can feel the sense of freedom ,of  letting go , because you still see clean lines, and reduced types of and materials  to keep the simplicity also in textures and colors , but it’s like an explosion if it, an explosion of modernism.

You can get an idea of concrete and metal in the image, and this materials made me remember Brutalism and as read in this book there was a rebirth of this movement (for a short time) during this period also.

 But what was Brutalism, Brutalism was also a reaction to Modernism( in my  opinion ) it used  a lot of concrete and really hard materials, the whole purpose of this was to create really “heavy” looking environments, some called it Modernism but for me it’s totally not, instead Brutalism was a reaction to modernism just like Deconstructivism. Instead of representing energy, freedom and chaos provoked by all this new paths that you could take, Brutalism represented the oppression felt during the modernist times, feeling of being trapped.

I know it sounds weird, being trapped in a clean line, spacious, minimal space. But in a way all that simplicity took away the connection with the person, and the feeling of protection provided by the home.

Obviously they both represented different feelings and reactions because Brutalism was mainly developed at the same time than modernism, while by the other hand Deconstructivism was a Post Modern movement. So for this I would link both of them as an evolution of the reaction provoked by the difference in the context in which each was developed.

At the same time if you made me choose I would definitely pick the Deconstruction movement. I really enjoy the fact that is a representation of the freedom felted, and if you watch different Deconstuctivist  interiors or constructions, you can find that link to Modernism to the simplicity of it, it doesn’t make you feel trapped, you still have the air, light and clean lines but in a more creative way, making it feel more human, because its expressing emotions, emotions that maybe in the Modernist movement where masked by the looks of a “perfect space”.

F!

Sources:

http://www.american-architecture.info/USA/USA-Boston/BO-011.htm

http://www.yatzer.com/CRYSTALS-by-Daniel-Libeskind-for-MGM-MIRAGE-City-Center