Notes Design

Lots of interesting content in the November issue of Fast Company magazine.

Can design save the world? Hilary Cottam thinks so.
Alice Rawsthorn, design critic of the International Herald Tribune, profiles Hilary Cottam, founding director of the social enterprise Participle, on her use of design to try to change the world for the better.
[If you want to know more about Hilary, read the lengthy interview I did with her last year for Torino World Design Capital.]

Three more who design for society
Meet three visionaries who solve social problems with design thinking: Ezio Manzini (Politecnico di Milano), Marcia Lausen (Design for Democracy) and George Kembel (Stanford D.school).

Building a sustainable design community
Anya Kamenetz reports on the highly laudable Designers Accord: "Valerie Casey is rallying the creative community to her version of a Kyoto treaty for designers -- and her peers are signing on in droves. Now comes the hard part."

Green guru gone wrong: William McDonough
This long feature story is probably a bomb. McDonough, the architect who developed the "cradle-to-cradle" concept, is widely revered as an environmental guru. The article describes McDonough as a great promoter with good intentions, who creates projects with often very mixed or even failed results.