With everyone and their mother jumping onto the green bandwagon, we’re bound to have a whole bunch of non-sustainable junk items pawned off as “green” by the loosest of standards, and a whole bunch of greenwashing. It’s something we have to be wary of and keep a diligent eye out for posers. An art project, “Subverting the Green Aesthetic,” helps us remember this and gives us a few IDing skills. Creator Nick Bampton is a design student in Middlesex who encourages people to take a closer look at green labels through his project of pairing green and un-green products with graphics that show there is more than meets the eye when it comes to the details of so-called green products. For instance, he shows two MP3 players, one that looks like it has sustainability on the brain, but in actually can’t be recycled, can’t be upgraded, and toxic substances are used in its manufacturing. The other MP3 player looks sleek in a non-sustainable way, but is more durable, can be upgraded, and recycled.
We seriously dig this here at EcoGeek, since one of the greenest things to do is make what you have last as long as possible, and if you have to get rid of it, recycle. Gadgets that are made to be unfixable or disposable – especially when they’re supposedly “green” or from a “green” company – are just completely uncool and are the essence of greenwashing.
Bampton pulls the same comparison trick with a pair of chairs and several other objects. This kind of project is a good reminder that there are a whole slew of factors that go into evaluating the sustainability of products that claim a green lineage.
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