The Secret of Happiness

Maybe because of Coca Cola's massive Open Happiness campaign for the 2010 Games, maybe because spring has come early and the cherry blossams make everything cheery. I am thinking about happiness. The Happiness Project recounts the author's daily adventures in pursuit of happiness, an instant NY Times bestseller, while the Future Well is a new design firm specializing in health and happiness. I'm thinking that the secret of happiness is simply discovering the things in the world that make us smile. For example this public poster series by the Dopludo Collective!

Desire to Communicate

Dr. Ron Burnett, President of Emily Carr University, and former teacher of mine shares his optimistic view of the Literate Future:

“The beauty of language is its flexibility and adaptability. The various modes of conversation to which we have become accustomed over centuries have a textured and rich quality that depends on our desire to communicate. That desire crosses nearly every cultural and political boundary on this shrinking earth. Rather than worry about whether text messaging will undermine literacy, we need to examine how to use all of the new modalities of communications now available to us to enhance the relationships we have with each other. That is the real challenge, quality of exchange, what we say and why and how all of that translates into modes of expression that can be understood and analyzed.”

What I take away from his closing paragraph is by simply having an open mind to our now multi modal existence, we may be able to better cherish and appreciate conversations, share knowledge and strengthen relationships; that the real challenge is to not waste our time and energy with mindless distraction. After all, feeling connected to family, friends and communities is the top sustainability issue for North Americans. Today, there have never been more ways to stay connected with one another.

I will be posting here more frequently, and am looking forward to it. Garnering information from multiple channels – feeds, tweets, newspapers, blogs and the SHIFT Report findings – to record and support the cultural shift to sustainability. It is happening, friends.

It's happening.

Although I am currently away from work on maternity leave, I can't help it. I want to stay involved – observing and participating in this cultural shift we are in, that is becoming ever more obvious. The above image is a slide I put together for Ci and in the background is a gigantic mindmap about sustainability + food. FOOD! From Food Inc. raising questions about where our food comes from, to Chipotle changing the nature of fast food in the USA, to Michael Pollen's new book Food Rules, to the rise of urban agriculture and people spending more time in their kitchens, I am inspired and hopeful that North Americans are waking up and asking the questions about what we are putting in our bodies and how it effects us. And then today on Oprah. Food 101 with Michael Pollan. It's really happening. The food revolution. We have a long way to go, I know this. But it's happening.

"The less we spend on food, the more we spend on health care" ~Michael Pollan

The Challenge Series

The Challenge Series tells the story of the people and the work behind the planning, designing and building of Vancouver's Olympic Village. For the past few years, I have had my eye on the site, wondering how it would all unfold, not knowing how involved I would get in learning about the site's history, policies and the development process. A crash course in urban design and sustainable community building.

Beginning last April, I began working for this project, brought on to essentially manage all the visual information for the seven chapter publication that would launch each new chapter monthly. Each chapter covered a different topic from History and Policy to Public Space and Infrastructure, Architecture, Water and Building Landscape, Energy, and Community.

There were thousands of images to sift through, collect, review, and choose. I worked with illustrators from Letterbox Design Group and Cobalt Engineering to develop schematics. I created each chapter's wireframe for publication, liaised with writers (New Climate Strategies) with respect to appropriate images for each story. I liaised with graphic designers (Mizu Creative) with respect to each chapter's wireframe, image hierarchy etc. and I put forth recommendations for the front and back covers.

All in all it was a fabulous project to be involved with– great people full of optimism and passion.

You can access all chapters here. I recommend downloading the low res pdfs for a more graphical / magazine type experience.

mirror/drink by maia love

Riddle: What am I? Transparent in a tipped glass, glistening on your lower lip before cascading down your throat, nourishing your cells. Melting off a mountain ice-block, somersaulting over stones, pooling in a mirror form before streaming down your pipes to land splash into your glass. As wealthy as diamonds, precious as platinum, rare as air. Escaping skyward as we gently slowly heat our globe-shaped home . . .

Dance piece by Maia Love.
Filmography by Hans Christian Berger.
Video edit by Moira Simpson.

Performed at the Vancouver Design Nerd's Jam at Recollective, April 2009.

Public Potluck Picnic

Spinning off from the last Design Nerd Jam which focussed on the convergence of a green and creative city, our group decided to organize an informal unstructured potluck picnic on the luscious grassy hill beside Science World. Fredrick who I met randomly in my group was keen to help organize and he put together the invitation. I sent out some emails and facebook invites and prayed to the weather Gods. They listened. It was lovely afternoon with a great little spread of tasty food and delicious conversation. Next time, more activities like kite flying, music playing, croquet and Frisbee. One highlight was Bruce showing up with his electric bike and mini sound system. Nerdtastic.

Weird

larytta - souvenir de chine - video directed by körner union

so weird. but i couldn't stop watching... trying to get posting again. starting with videos. more writing and personal work to come soon.

Feeling tiny, yet connected

Well.  

Here we are coming around the southern tip of San Juan Island druing the first leg of Round the County 2008.  Can't get much closer to weather than this, for now.

Far away, however, I read about the Asian skies.  Poisoned with soot, smog and toxic chemicals, the by product of massive developments in all industry categories - transportation, agriculture, building, cooking, and general mass production and export to the west.

''The imperative to act has never been clearer,'' said Achim Steiner, executive director of the United Nations Environment Program, in Beijing, where the report, titled ''Atmospheric Brown Clouds: Regional Assessment Report With Focus on Asia,'' was released.

Story via World Business Council on Sustainable Development.  Link here.

Eep.

LaP: Learning at Parties

I was at a party Friday night. It was full of costumes, revelry and merriment. At one point well into the night, we stepped outside and enter into a fantastic conversation about energy. I remember that I could see the nearly full moon reflecting in the window of the house. Djs behind the glass. Dance floor behind the DJ. I don't remember how the conversation even started. LC proposes Manhattan Project 2.0 for renewable energy. "Do it. Put 500 billion into it!!! (as opposed to spending it on the war on terror)". I wasn't aware of the Manhattan Project (until I asked). No, I was thinking about the Manhatta Project which I JUST read about in article about Spatial History on World Changing. It is similar to the Lost Creeks of Vancouver but I think that bringing spatial history and place into the discourse adds new layers of richness and relevance to the project.



Spatial history asks:

What did our cities look like pre European history?

What was this place???

What has it been?


Basically, anything regarding place.

Hello baby hawk

Walking home yesterday, we had an encounter. So close to home. In the city.

Talk nerdy to me

 
Amazing Czech biking history from Fransisco.  What a nerd.

Ms. Li Shurui - long now thinker and artist.

I happen to think this photo is incredibly powerful. An article in the New York Times featured a hand full of contemporary artists who are said to be quietly emerging to stardom, in Beijing. Female artists are nearly invisible in a male dominated force. Brave souls.

Photo: Natalie Behring for The New York Times

It may say something about Ms. Li's present and future thinking, though, that when asked to name a cultural role model, she pointed neither to other artists nor to contemporary politics, but to the deep past: to the seventh-century ruler Wu Zetian, who through a combination of brains, beauty, unsparing ambition and tenacious hard work, became China’s first and only female empress.

minimal realism

I don't even know if I'd ever get a tattoo.. but if I did.. I would look to Charles Harper for inspiration. This guy is amazing.

I was going to post about pollution in Beijing, but I already did that yesterday at Ci.

Human Development Index ~ for the developed

B+, as usual.

http://measureofamerica.org/
via: http://www.humantific.com/

359 nodes and 2799 links

PSFK conference in SFO

Yesterday I went to my first conference as a creative strategist with Ci. Oooooh moving up! PSFK hosts creative idea conferences in cities around the world and yesterday's took place at an old military base near the water in San Fransisco. Many of the speakers focussed on technology enabling community building and one particular speaker from Apple - Chris Riley - spoke of three highly influential people - Stewart Brand, Alice Waters and Paul Hawken. I just had to thank him at the end of the day. Another highlight was Max Schor from GOOD Magazine. Very refreshing, humbling and thought provoking. He asked the audience as he was getting started - "How many people want to make things better?" Not a single person did not raise their hand. The room was certainly filled with optimistic bright creative (and nerdy) bodies, minds and souls.

The best surprise for me was the fact that the Long Now Foundation was just next door and I got to see the prototypes for the 10 000 year clock! I was in heaven. I had done quite a bit of research on Stewart Brand for my thesis. Some call him the smartest man in America. Look him up! The Foundation exists for the sole and brave purpose of encouraging us all to adopt a long term view. We're talking centuries and millenniums. What a breath of fresh air considering the conference was all about trends and what they mean and where we're going.

More in line with the 'short view', I couldn't get over how many people were talking about Twitter! This is something I have not really been interested in adopting - maybe because I find the name a bit irritating. Hmmmm.

Some of the recurring themes I noticed during the day - take risks, do the right thing the right way and the business model will follow, don't be afraid to fail, be considerate, listen to people, experiment, play, and of course - collaborate! Look outside your own discipline and geography for inspiration. Oh yes, and have fun!!!

Speaking of fun, here are some photos from the after party!
Thanks to Orange Exposure for the great photos.


Serge, Sarah and Rachel

Piers Fawkes and Max Schor

What a great day! Looking forward to more of this!

raftacular

It was always my intention to keep the RAFT project going after school. It was always my intention to develop a simple design that could be scalable, adaptable, modular and work with materials at hand. I am so grateful for having met the fantastic people at eatART who are now supporting (and storing) this project at the hangar. Our mutual love for the sea as well as things like civil disobedience, energy awareness, creativity, invention, and general mayhem brought us all together this weekend, dressed like pirates, armed with a potato canon and ready for adventure. ( : So fun!!!

Ci newsletter chock full of nuggets

Ci, the company I now work for as a 'creative strategist' publishes a juicy newsletter called soundbite once in a while that shares some intelligence surrounding the SHIFT Report. I've blogged about it before - What do 5000 main stream North American's think (and behave) around issues related to sustainability and social responsibility. In a nut shell, it's way more than green green green.

Another feature on this one is a brand rivalry poll - Are Microsoft customers more concerned about the environment than Mac customers? Do people who drink Coke care more about local and organic than Pepsi drinkers? Is there really a difference between the people who buy Method and those who buy Clorox? Ci will profile the rivalry that has the most votes.

I encourage anyone reading this to sign up for the newsletter and stay in touch. This company is smart and ambitious. Two good things I like to see in an employer of mine. ( :

data art + love

"I Want You To Want Me", by Jonathan Harris and Sep Kamvar, commissioned by the Museum of Modern Art, for their "Design and the Elastic Mind" exhibition. It examines and organizes data from online dating sites and reveals some deep insights into who we are and what we are looking for. Of course, it also shows us how data can be turned into art.

:: via Ed Cotton at www.influxinsights.com

hello, lawrence weiner

I recently saw a Lawrence Weiner (and John Baldessari) show at the Apt. I went with Alex and Katrin which was a treat in of itself. I hadn't heard of either of the artists before this week. It was a private showing so we learned a lot about conceptual art and 'the business of. Alex asks the best questions. And since then (of course) I recognize the names. So you can imagine the delight of seeing this short video which I first saw on Kara's fabulous oliveisgreen. Check it oot.