[Editor’s Note: Below is a guest post from colleague, blogger and fellow architect Brandon Specketer. With years of experience in sustainable architecture and graphic design, Brandon is currently a resident of New York City’s Upper West Side and works as an Associate at Cook+Fox Architects.]
A question has been rattling around in my head because of the holidays – is our current consumerist culture incompatible with the larger goals of sustainability? While the atmosphere of the holiday season has subsided, what remains among the drifts of accumulated snow are piles of trash. Bags filled with empty boxes of computers, clothes, books and other gifts that had been given and received. All of this is because of the heavy influence cultural conventions have on our behavior. While the consumer culture may be the elephant in the room when it comes to bigger environmental and social discussions, I do believe that there are businesses like the Paris shop Merci that use consumerism to serve larger environmental or social goals. Continue Reading…