Design Council is a Business Reporter client. Most of the environmental impact of any new product is determined at the design stage – which means the power to positively change that is in the hands of designers Design is all around us. From architecture to fashion, products to graphics, transport to technology – your coffee cup, your house, your mobile phone – it all begins with design.
Throughout history, design has changed our lives for the better. And now, in the face of the climate emergency, it could again be design’s time to shine. Over the past 80 years the Design Council has championed British design in its role as the national strategic advisor on design.
Founded in 1944 by Winston Churchill’s government to help accelerate post-war economic growth, today it is on a mission to put the planet at the heart of the sector’s work. The Design Council’s power can be harnessed to accelerate a mass transition from our current consumer economy to a future regenerative society. Good design is green design.
By designing more effectively and more efficiently we could revive biodiversity, reduce our waste and bring Net Zero targets closer. Designers can choose durable or biodegradable materials, ensure that repair is possible and simple, reimagine our places, retrofit our buildings and plan for what happens at the end of a design’s life-cycle. The Design Council’s flagship research programme Design Economy showed that in 2019 there were 1.
97 million people working.
