Green thinking in design

In recent years, the terms green design, green products, green food, green industry, and so on have become familiar to all industries. Green has also become one of the characteristics of the product era. Beijing 2008 Olympic Games also put forward the slogan of the Green Olympics. No matter what the product is, as long as it is linked with the green, it will be able to reborn and be invincible in the competition. This wave of green consumption can be said to have been for a long time, but what is the true meaning of this green product seems to have been ignored and obscured by people.



The earliest proposed green design idea was in the 1960s. In the late 1980s, the first wave of “green consumption” was started in the United States, which then swept the world. Green refrigerators, green TVs, green computers and other green products continue to emerge, and consumers are increasingly advocating green products. Green design became a hot issue in the study of modern design technology in the 1990s.

The so-called green material refers to materials that are renewable, recyclable, and environmentally friendly with low energy consumption. Therefore, we should be the first choice in the design of environmentally compatible materials and components to avoid the selection of toxic, hazardous and radiation-emitting materials. The materials used should be easily reused, recycled, remanufactured, or easily degraded to increase resource utilization and achieve sustainable development. In addition, the types of materials should also be minimized in order to reduce the cost of recycling after product disposal.

The design of recyclability is to fully consider the problem of recycling and reuse of the product after its end-of-life product design. That is, it should not only facilitate the disassembly and separation of parts, but also make the reusable parts and materials in the design. The product is fully valued. Recycling and reuse of resources are the main goals of recycling design. There are generally two approaches to this, namely the recycling of raw materials and the reuse of spare parts. Due to the difficulty and high cost of material recycling, the more reasonable way to recover resources is to reuse components.

In order to reduce the cost of assembly and disassembly of the product, we must use the simplest structure and shape as far as possible to meet the functional requirements and the requirements for use. The types of parts and components that make up the product are as few as possible. And with an easy-to-remove coupling method, the number of fasteners at the removal site is as small as possible.

The green packaging of the product mainly includes the following principles: The material is the most provincial, that is, under the functional conditions that the green packaging meets the requirements of protection, convenience, sales, and provision of information, it should be a moderately civilized moderate packaging; Or easy to degrade, non-toxic packaging material to the human body. For example, paper packaging can be easily recycled and reused. It is also easy to decompose naturally in nature and does not pollute the environment.

From the content of green design, we can see that the starting point of green design is mainly on the technical level, from the perspective of environmental protection and energy conservation. This is a reflection of the "nature-based" design philosophy, and also reflects the return of modern designers' morality and social responsibility.

However, green design should not only remain at the technical level, but should also be reflected in the design of thinking and principles. Green design is a change in the concept of design, requiring designers to design a more concise, long-lasting, perfect product in a more responsible way. For example, in 1994, philip starck designed a green TV for a company in France, in addition to the use of a recyclable material in technology, in the shape and style, but also reflects a simple, lasting, safe "green" feeling.

The meaning of green design is the embodiment of the "people-oriented" design principle. Green thinking is also a reflection of human thinking. Therefore, in the product design, the content of the green design, in addition to the aforementioned, must also be added, that is, the humanized design of the product, that is, focusing on the product can better meet individual needs, including more complete features, use it More safe, comfortable, more beautiful appearance and so on. The green thinking in product design should also include the meaning of safety, nature, and humanity, so that it can be regarded as a true green product.

Green design is called "another efficiency revolution in industrial production" and has become a mainstream direction in current product design. For a long time, it will be a design principle that needs to be considered and emphasized in product design. However, so far, green products are mostly “green” in a certain technical aspect, rather than achieving “green” in the full sense of the entire life cycle of a product. Green design should not only stay on the technical level, but should rise to the height of design concepts and design principles. Therefore, we must clarify the true meaning of green thinking in product design and how to apply green thinking to design. In this way, we can design more and better green products and reflect the meaning of “green”.

Author: Doolin