A Sustainable Design Reading List: Suggested Books & Catalogs

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  Metropolis Books Material Change Design Thinking and the Social Entrepreneurship Movement Material Change shows that there is something going on in design-something powerful. Design can change the world. This new way of thinking is revolutionizing the business of design and the design of business. Material Change is the story of trained architect and entrepreneur Eve Blossom, who built her design business, Lulan Artisans, on a framework of ecological, economic, social, communal and cultural sustainability. Lulan Artisans is a for-profit social venture that designs, produces and markets contemporary textiles made by Blossom's collaborators-over 650 weavers, dyers, spinners and finishers in Cambodia, India, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam. Lulan's mission is to effect systemic social change: to give workers an ample wage and benefits; to bring stability to communities by creating jobs; to preserve artisanal skills; and to provide economic alternatives so that individuals can make better economic choices. In the book, we follow Eve's process of forming a grassroots, for-profit social venture. She openly shares her story . . . . [see book details]

  By Eve Blossom. Foreword by Yves Behar. Flexi, 7 x 8.5 in. / 160 pgs / 130 color. Publication Date: 10/31/2011 List Price: US $30.00

  Metropolis Books Beyond Shelter Architecture and Human Dignity Across Africa, Asia, Latin America and the United States, groundbreaking work is being done by small teams of outstanding professionals who are helping communities to recover from disaster and rebuild, bridging the gap that separates short-term emergency needs from long-term sustainable recovery. Questions about the role and responsibility of architects in disaster recovery have been circulating since the Indian Ocean tsunami killed more than 200,000 people in 2004. In the last decade, 200 million people have been affected by natural disasters and hazards. Ninety-eight percent of these victims are in the developing world, where billions of dollars in aid are absorbed annually by climatic and geologic crises. Those in the developed world are not immune, as extreme temperatures, intense heat waves, increased flooding and droughts expose vast numbers of people to the experience of the eco-refugee. Beyond Shelter is a call to action. It features 20 generously illustrated reports from the . . . . [see book details]

  Edited by Marie J. Aquilino. Text by Sheikh Ahsan Ahmed, Zahid Amin, Marie J. Aquilino, Jennifer E. Duyne Barestein, Alfredo Brillembourg, Guillaume Chantry, Patrick Coulombel, Robin Cross, Teddy Cruz, James Dart, Rajedra and Rupal Desai, Sandra D'Urzo, Guy Fimmers, Andrea Fitrianto, Francesca Galeazzi, Deborah Gans, Mehran Gharaati, Victoria L. Harris, Rohit Jigyasu, Jenny Kivett, Hubert Klumpner, Arlene Lusterio, Andrea Nield, John Norton, Kimon Onuma, Sergio Palleroni, Raul Pantaleo, Dan Rockhill, Brittany Smith, Maggie Stephenson, Anita Van Breda, Thiruppugazh Venkatachalam, Naomi Handa Williams. Pbk, 8 x 8 in. / 304 pgs / 300 color. Publication Date: 7/31/2011 List Price: US $35.00

  Hatje Cantz Re-Designing Nature Zones in which nature can offset the tyranny of the built environment are an essential part of any satisfying urban experience, aesthetically and ecologically. (Re)Designing Nature presents innovative design concepts for enhancing the presence and presentation of nature in cities. Inspiring its readers to contemplate our current relationship to nature, it animates debates about ecologically sustainable and aesthetically intelligent environmental design. In particular, the twin phenomena of rapidly shrinking cities and rapidly expanding megacities call for new models for the intercession and housing of urban nature. Artists and landscape architects offer proposals for alternative uses of empty city lots and old industrial areas, designing parasitical gardens in the middle of the city or utopian visions for a greater symbiosis of culture and nature. Maria Auböck, Susanne Hauser, Florian Matzner, Iris Meder, Bruno De Meulder, Kelly Shannon and Susanne Witzgall discuss various aspects of the project. . . . . [see book details]

  Edited by Florian Matzner, Susanne Witzgall, Iris Meder. Pbk, 8.25 x 9.75 in. / 205 pgs / 204 color. Publication Date: 4/30/2011 List Price: US $45.00

  The Museum of Modern Art, New York Rising Currents Projects for New York's Waterfront In the fall of 2009, The Museum of Modern Art and MoMA PS1 selected five interdisciplinary teams of architects, engineers and landscape designers to propose solutions to the effects of climate change on New York's waterfront. The resulting proposals, exhibited at MoMA in 2010 in the exhibition Rising Currents: Projects for New York's Waterfront, emphasize "soft" infrastructure interventions that would make New York City and its surrounding areas more ecologically sound and more resilient in responding to rising sea levels and storm surges. These innovative projects include the creation of salt- and freshwater wetlands, a Venice-like aqueous landscape, habitable piers and man-made islands, and a protective reef of living oysters. Published to document the exhibition, Rising Currents: Projects for New York's Waterfront presents these five projects in detail through essays that summarize the innovative workshop and exhibition, the dialogues they engendered with outside experts and political figures involved in regional planning, . . . . [see book details]

  Edited by Barry Bergdoll. Foreword by Judith Rodin. Text by Barry Bergdoll, Michael Oppenheimer, Guy Nordenson. Pbk, 8 x 10 in. / 112 pgs / 106 color. Publication Date: 12/31/2011 List Price: US $24.95

  Ivorypress Buckminster Fuller: Dymaxion Car In 1933, the visionary architect, engineer and designer Buckminster Fuller (1895-1983) built a car that was at that time the world's most fuel-efficient car. The Dymaxion Car ran on 35 miles per gallon, while every other car on the road struggled to manage half that amount; zeppelin-like in appearance, it was streamlined to minimize wind resistance and was capable of carrying six to eight passengers. Fuller designed two more Dymaxion Cars over the following year, though none of the three saw production. In his book Everything I Know (1975), Fuller remembered: "Many people said to me, after I built three of these cars, 'I'm sorry your car wasn't a success.' And I'd say 'What do you mean?' They said, 'Well you didn't get it into production.' I said, 'I wasn't going into business, I was producing a vehicle. And it was extremely successful. I learned an incredible amount.'" Today the Dymaxion . . . . [see book details]

  Edited by Hsiao-Yun Chu, David Jenkins. Text by Jonathan Glancey, Norman Foster. Clth, 10 x 10.25 in. / 224 pgs / 111 color / 135 b&w. Publication Date: 2/28/2011 List Price: US $75.00

  Jovis Energy Atlas Future Concept Renewable Wilhelmsburg Global climate change calls for swift, decisive measures, particularly from the world's metropolises. But how can cities ensure that urgently needed strategies are enacted, forging a path to a post-fossil fuel, post-atomic energy era? Using one district in Hamburg, Germany, as an example, Energy Atlas investigates how it might provide a model for future sustainability. . . . . [see book details]

  Pbk, 9.5 x 10.25 in. / 224 pgs / 300 color. Publication Date: 4/30/2011 List Price: US $39.95

  Metropolis Books Expanding Architecture: Design as Activism Expanding Architecture presents a new generation of creative design carried out in the service of the greater public and the greater good. Questioning how design can improve daily lives, editors Bryan Bell and Katie Wakeford map an emerging geography of architectural activism--or "public-interest architecture"--that might function akin to public-interest law or medicine by expanding architecture's all too often elite client base. With 30 essays by practicing architects and designers, urban and community planners, historians, landscape architects, environmental designers and members of other fields, this volume presents recent work from around the world that illustrates the ways in which design can address issues of social justice, allow individuals and communities to plan and improve their own lives and serve a much larger percentage of the population than it has in the past. This new inclusionary practice must define new services and new processes, and these are illuminated in the generously illustrated texts . . . . [see book details]

  Edited by Bryan Bell and Katie Wakeford. Foreword by Thomas Fisher. Texts by Steve Badanes, Roberta M. Feldman, Sergio Palleroni, John Peterson, Katie Swenson, et al. Paperback, 6.5 x 9 in. / 288 pgs / 120 color / 30 b&w. Publication Date: 10/1/2008 List Price: US $34.95

  NAi Publishers Green Dream How Future Cities Can Outsmart Nature Green Dream investigates what "green" means in practical terms for design, architecture and urbanism. Led by The Why Factory, the global urbanist thinktank headed by Winy Maas, experts in the field debate what is currently considered green and how the term ought to be defined going forward, challenging architectural conventions and looking into the potential of new green architecture. Recognizing that green buildings alone do not make a green city, Green Dream also looks at broader green solutions for cities and how they might be implemented. Most importantly of all, the book dares to ask "Is a green city actually feasible?" and attempts to answer this question through the help of case studies. Drawing on 36 illustrated green projects, and with essays by John Thackara and Winy Maas, this volume outlines future goals for architectural and urban projects, and draws on research by The Why Factory, MVRDV and Delft University of . . . . [see book details]

  Text by Winy Maas, John Thackara. Pbk, 6 x 8.25 in. / 408 pgs / 300 color. Publication Date: 9/30/2010 List Price: US $45.00

  Metropolis Books Green Patriot Posters This book brings together the strongest contemporary graphic design currently promoting sustainability and the fight against climate change. Collectively, essays by Michael Bierut, Steven Heller, Edward Morris and Dmitri Siegel look back in time to posters and ideas that set the stage for the current movement (World War Two posters, images of international cooperation, posters from the environmental movement in the 1960s and 1970s) and address the state of the poster: what is the efficacy and mode of distribution for purposeful, message-oriented graphic images today? Thomas L. Friedman advocates for "a redefined, broader and more muscular green ideology that can be the basis of a new unifying political movement for the twenty-first century." The bulk of the book is given over to a compilation of the best posters on the theme of sustainability by a variety of contemporary artists (both emerging and established), among them Shepard Fairey, Michael Bierut, DJ Spooky, . . . . [see book details]

  Edited by Edward Morris, Dmitri Siegel. Text by Michael Bierut, Thomas L. Friedman, Steven Heller, Edward Morris, Dmitri Siegel, Morgan Clendaniel. Pbk, 9.5 x 12.5 in. / 128 pgs / 100 color / 50 tear-out posters. Publication Date: 11/30/2010 List Price: US $30.00

  Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, Smithsonian Institution Why Design Now? National Design Triennial Why design now? As issues of ecology and sustainable living continue to gain in urgency and topicality, design has come to the forefront of the arts as the discipline best equipped to meet today's challenges. Designers around the world are rising to this clarion call by creating products, buildings, landscapes, messages and more that address important social and ecological problems. Why Design Now? National Design Triennial accompanies the fourth installation in Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum's acclaimed National Design Triennial exhibition series. Designed by Michael Bierut, a partner in the award-winning design firm Pentagram, Why Design Now? is the first Triennial book to be truly international in reach, with 134 designers and projects in more than 44 countries. With eight essays by four Cooper-Hewitt curators, project profiles and more than 350 color illustrations, many of which have never been published before, Why Design Now? offers a glimpse into contemporary innovation, and an . . . . [see book details]

  Text by Ellen Lupton, Cara McCarty, Matilda McQuaid, Cynthia Smith. Hbk, 8.5 x 11 / 192 pgs / 370 color. Publication Date: 5/31/2010 List Price: US $40.00

  The Museum of Modern Art, New York Small Scale, Big Change New Architectures of Social Engagement The role of the global architect in society is changing. Instead of waiting for commissions to come their way, architects are initiating and developing practical solutions in response to dramatically changing living conditions in many parts of the world today. Small Scale, Big Change focuses on a central chapter of this shift, presenting recently built or under-construction works in underserved communities around the globe by these 11 architects and firms: Elemental (Chilean); Anna Heringer (Austrian); Diébédo Francis Kéré (Burkinabé); Hashim Sarkis A.L.U.D. (Lebanese); Jorge Mario Jáuregui (Brazilian); Frédéric Druot, Anne Lacaton & Jean Philippe Vassal (French); Michael Maltzan Architecture (American); Noero Wolff Architects (South African); Rural Studio (American); Estudio Teddy Cruz (American, born Guatemala); and Urban Think Tank (American/Austrian/Venezuelan). Without sacrificing concern for aesthetics, these architects have developed projects that reveal a post-utopian specificity of place; their architectural solutions emerge from close collaboration with future users and sustained research into local . . . . [see book details]

  Introduction by Barry Bergdoll. Text by Andres Lepik. Pbk, 8 x 10 in. / 140 pgs / 170 color. Publication Date: 10/31/2010 List Price: US $37.50

  D.A.P./Distributed Art Publishers Sustainism Is the New Modernism A Cultural Manifesto for the Sustainist Era Michiel Schwarz and Joost Elffers' Sustainism Is the New Modernism declares the dawn of a new cultural era, as we transition from modernity to sustainity--towards a world that is more connected, more localist, more digital and more sustainable. As the authors of this clear-eyed manifesto argue, "sustainism marks a shift not only in thinking and doing but in collective perception--of how we live, do business, feed ourselves, design, travel and communicate, as much as how we deal with nature." In the twentieth century, whether we knew it or not, our world was shaped by modernist values, from the design of our cities to our homes, technologies and our conceptions of progress. Sustainism recasts our relationship to all of these things, binding ecological issues to a larger picture of our world. Through a series of graphically dynamic aphorisms, quotes and symbols designed for worldwide use by businesses, individuals and institutions, to signal . . . . [see book details]

  By Michiel Schwarz, Joost Elffers. Pbk, 7 x 9 in. / 240 pgs / color. Publication Date: 12/31/2010 List Price: US $24.95

  Metropolis Books Design Revolution: 100 Products That Empower People By Emily Pilloton In January of 2008, with a thousand dollars, a laptop and an outsized conviction that design can change the world, rising San Francisco-based product designer and activist Emily Pilloton launched Project H Design, a radical non-profit that supports, inspires and delivers life-improving humanitarian product design. "We need to go beyond 'going green' and to enlist a new generation of design activists," she wrote in an influential manifesto. "We need big hearts, bigger business sense and the bravery to take action now." Featuring more than 100 contemporary design products and systems--safer baby bottles, a high-tech waterless washing machine, low-cost prosthetics for landmine victims, Braille-based Lego-style building blocks for blind children, wheelchairs for rugged conditions, sugarcane charcoal, universal composting systems, DIY soccer balls--that are as fascinating as they are revolutionary, this exceptionally smart, friendly and well-designed volume makes the case for design as a tool to solve some of the world's biggest social problems . . . . [see book details]

  By Emily Pilloton. Foreword by Allan Chochinov. Pbk, 8 x 8 in. / 304 pgs / 250 color. Publication Date: 10/31/2009 List Price: US $34.95

  Metropolis Books Design Like You Give A Damn: Architectural Responses To Humanitarian Crises The greatest humanitarian challenge we face today is that of providing shelter. Currently, one in seven people lives in a slum or refugee camp, and more than 3,000,000,000 people--nearly half the world's population--do not have access to clean water or adequate sanitation. The physical design of our homes, neighborhoods and communities shapes every aspect of our lives. Yet too often architects are desperately needed in the places where they can least be afforded. Edited by Architecture for Humanity and now on its fifth printing, Design Like You Give a Damn is a compendium of innovative projects from around the world that demonstrate the power of design to improve lives. The first book to bring the best of humanitarian architecture and design to the printed page, Design Like You Give a Damn offers a history of the movement toward socially conscious design, and showcases more than 80 contemporary solutions to such urgent needs . . . . [see book details]

  Edited by Cameron Sinclair and Kate Stohr. Paperback, 8 x 8 in. / 336 pgs / 350 color. Publication Date: 1/15/2006 List Price: US $35.00

  Metropolis Books Edible Estates: Attack on the Front Lawn, 2nd Revised Edition A Project by Fritz Haeg Since the first edition of Edible Estates: Attack on the Front Lawn was published in 2008, interest in edible gardening has exploded across the United States and abroad. Even First Lady Michelle Obama is doing it! This greatly expanded second edition of the book documents the eight Edible Estates regional prototype gardens that author Fritz Haeg has planted in California, Kansas, Texas, Maryland, New Jersey, New York and England, and includes personal accounts from the homeowner-gardeners about the pleasures and challenges of publicly growing food where they live. Ten Reports from Coast to Coast” tell the stories of others who have planted their own edible front yards in towns and cities across the country. In addition to essays by renowned landscape architect and scholar Diana Balmori, edible-landscaping pioneer Rosalind Creasy, bestselling author and sustainable-food advocate Michael Pollan and artist and writer Lesley Stern, this edition features updated text by Haeg (including . . . . [see book details]

  Preface by Fritz Haeg. Text by Will Allen, Diana Balmori, Rosalind Creasy, Fritz Haeg, Michael Pollan, Eric W. Sanderson, Lesley Stern, et al. Pbk, 8.5 x 8.5 in. / 176 pgs / 86 color / 85 b&w. Publication Date: 3/31/2010 List Price: US $24.95

  Hatje Cantz Arium: Weather & Architecture Today, economic and ecological forces have finally collided and forced humankind to reassess its relationship to each. For architecture, this means facing its nemesis: the weather, with its attendant forces of instability and unpredictability. The role of architecture has always been to demarcate an area away from these forces, in which humankind can regulate its own needs. Now, the worldwide sustainability movement calls for an architecture that does not resist but incorporates or accommodates atmospheric turbulence. Arium examines the curious relationship between weather and architecture, addressing instances where architecture has both brilliantly collaborated with and foolishly failed to anticipate weather patterns such as wind tunnels and heat exposure, and demonstrating that this relationship need not always be antagonistic. Begun as a research project under the direction of architect Jürgen Mayer H. from Berlin and urban designer Neeraj Bhatia from Toronto, Arium offers a revelatory in-depth look at this urgent topic through . . . . [see book details]

  Edited by Neeraj Bhatia, Jürgen Mayer H. Text by George Baird, Chad Dembski, Robert Levit, Henry Urbach, Mason White, Rodolphe el-Khoury. Contributions by Eric Bury. Hbk, 6.25 x 9.25 in. / 320 pgs / 37 color / 170 b&w. Publication Date: 3/31/2010 List Price: US $55.00

  NAi Publishers Architecture of Consequence Dutch Designs on the Future Architecture of Consequence began life as the Dutch presentation at the São Paolo Architecture Biennale in 2009. Shape our country!” was the call that the Netherlands Architecture Institute (NAi) made to its public over a six-month period. The result was a deluge of proposals, as the people of the Netherlands rose to the challenge of naming their needs: new guidelines for food production, alternative energy sources, solutions for space shortage, social cohesion, a healthy living environment and the recalibration of economic value. Formulating responses to such fundamental questions of our time is, it seems, everyone's business. All of the above issues converge at spatial planning and design, where real opportunities for social innovation still await. For this project, the Netherlands Architecture Institute selected 22 Dutch architecture firms with genuinely innovative ideas on these seven imperatives and the will to do something about them. The result is an agenda for the future . . . . [see book details]

  Text by Ole Bouman, Anneke Abhelakh, Martine Zoeteman, Mieke Dings. Pbk, 8 x 10 in. / 168 pgs / 128 color. Publication Date: 3/31/2010 List Price: US $35.00

  NAi Publishers Visionary Cities 12 Reasons for Claiming the Future of our Cities Recognizing that our civic responsibilities towards our environments have drastically increased, Visionary Cities ambitiously sets the agenda for the city of the future. Amid crippling bureaucracies and economic crises, present-day thinking on city design remains woefully inadequate, and this first publication in NAi's Future Cities Series announces 12 civic issues that are in need of transformation through the researches of The Why Factory, a global urban-studies thinktank operated in part by the Delft University of Technology. These issues include: The Solitary (Our Dreams are Undermining the City)”; The Iconic (Our Idols Have Been Compromised)”; The Fun (We Are Having Too Much Fun)”; The Cautious (Being Careful Is Killing Us)”; The Poor (Slums Are Growing Bigger Than The Cities They Are Part Of”; and The Future (Our Future Is Being Imagined Without Us).” A howl against civic impotence and the apathy of citizens in the face of incompetence and decay, Visionary Cities . . . . [see book details]

  Edited and with text by Winy Maas and The Why Factory. Pbk, 5.75 x 8.25 in. / 240 pgs / 100 color. Publication Date: 3/31/2010 List Price: US $25.00

  NAi Publishers Comeback Cities Transformation Strategies for Former Industrial Cities For centuries, certain cities in Europe were dominated by the textile industry—until the industry relocated to lower-wage countries, leaving these formerly prosperous cities languishing, their abandoned factories sitting unpurposed and untenanted. Comeback Cities presents the results of a unique study of the period following the demise of the textile industry across cities in the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, England, Finland, France, Italy and Poland. The research focuses on the solutions these cities have conceived to recover from today's outsource economy. In a variety of case studies, Comeback Cities stimulates discussion on urban revitalization and international cooperation. Alongside this research, the book surveys the worldwide debate on this topic, and is richly illustrated with photographs. . . . . [see book details]

  Text by Nienke van Boom, Hans Mommaas. Flexi, 6.75 x 9.75 in. / 256 pgs / 150 color. Publication Date: 3/31/2010 List Price: US $55.00

  Edizioni Corraini/Canadian Centre for Architecture Sorry, Out of Gas Architecture's Response to the 1973 Oil Crisis The year 1973 marks one of the most important turning points in the history of the twentieth century. Prior to that year, the world had become accustomed to a plentiful supply of inexpensive fossil fuels--especially oil. During this first major international oil crisis, however, the western world's dependency on unstable eastern energy resources became dramatically clear. Published to accompany the comprehensive and enlightening 2008 exhibition, 1973: Sorry, Out of Gas, hosted by the Canadian Centre for Architecture in Montreal, this beautifully designed, frightening and strangely inspiring volume examines the oil crisis of 1973 as the major precedent of contemporary concerns about energy resources and fossil fuel dependency. The 1973 shortage triggered research and development of renewable energy sources, improved technologies and sparked social experiments that were to have an enduring impact on the fields of architecture and policy in both America and Europe. Put together by the acclaimed Italian book designer . . . . [see book details]

  Edited by Giovanna Borasi, Mirko Zardini. Texts by Adam Bobbette, Daria Der Kaloustian, Pierre-Édouard Latouche, Caroline Maniaque. Paperback, 6.75 x 9.75 in. / 236 pages / 150 color / 78 b&w. Publication Date: 1/1/2008 List Price: US $49.95

  Jovis Energizing Architecture Design and Photovoltaics The harnessing of solar energy via photovoltaic (i.e. solar electrical) technology has become one of the world's highest priorities, as dwindling oil resources compel nations all over the world to reconsider their energy policies. Soon, many countries will be able to produce as much as 25 percent of their electricity through photovoltaics--that is, if architecture can rise to the challenge and integrate its visual and design language with that of photovoltaic systems. This challenge has already been tackled in a huge variety of projects, and Energizing Architecture presents the full range of possible photovoltaic modules, using realized buildings as examples. Intended for planners, architects and anybody concerned with the field of environmental design, it provides an index of all relevant materials, and demonstrates that the integration of photovoltaics into architectural practice can be achieved with aesthetically pleasing results. . . . . [see book details]

  Edited by Claudia Lühling. Pbk, 6.75 x 9.25 in. / 192 pgs / 150 color. Publication Date: 12/31/2009 List Price: US $48.00