buildings

When we become the hired guns of greed-driven corporations, we are driven to conform.

If we generate status kitsch for a jaded elite, and allow ourselves to become media celebrities, we perform.

When we twist products to reflect the navel-gazing of market research, we deform.

If our products divorce appearance and other functions – a telephone that looks like a duck and quacks instead of ringing, a clock-radio that looks like a female leg – we misinform.

When our designs are succinct statements of purpose, easy to understand, use, maintain and repair, long-lasting, recyclable, and benign to the environment, we inform.

If we design with harmony and balance in mind, working for the good of the weaker members of our society, we reform.

Being willing to accept the consequences of our design interventions, and accepting our social and moral responsibilities, we give form.

- Victor Papanek, The Green Imperative.

Image: Staircase at the BC Cancer Research Centre, Vancouver – by slightly-less-random.

The Green Imperative at Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com.