Project H Design: Initiatives for Humanity, Habitats, Health and Happines
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 01. 3.08
Ted Nordhaus said "to a hammer, the whole world looks like a nail". I responded "I am an architect and to me, the world looks like a big design problem". That's why I love the idea of Project H Design, "a charitable organization supporting product design initiatives for humanity, habitats, health, and happiness."- We all have our particular talents and capabilities, and we can all contribute, whether you are a hammer or an architect or a doctor or a plumber, you can effect change.
Project H plans to encourage the design industry to "Fund and deliver existing life-improving and life-saving products to specific global communities" and "Host competitions that encourage designers and communities to address and understand global and social issues, and use design as a tool to propose solutions."
It was founded by Emily Pilloton, who in her spare time is managing editor of Inhabitat and is giving us a run for the money covering the green design scene. The opening page is a review of every great idea that designers have had to desalinate or move water, carry things cheaply, provide prosthetics or just make life better for people because they are using things that are well designed.
Some of her "case studies" include putting into the field the things TreeHugger writes about:
Our “Fund This Product” program takes applications for aid from across the globe, works with communities to assess their needs, raises funds to purchase the needed products, and delivers them to the group who needs them. 500 XO Laptops (One Laptop Per Child), 300 Lifestraws, 10 MoneyMaker irrigation pumps…
So Project H Design is joining ::Architecture for Humanity on my list of great causes to promote. ::Project H Design
I love the picture of the kids with the laptops because it utterly disgusts me. It seems as though many non profits and government agencies feel that the best help is to throw a developing country into the global economy by giving them the tools and knowledge necessary to contribute to the free market. However, time and time again this seems to utterly destroy the country, it's people, and their existing culture. I feel that it may be better to help a developing nation to be as self sufficient as possible; and self sufficiency does not require internet access.
Just try and remember that cultures and people have been living fine without modern design and appliances for thousands of years.
In the first picture, aren't those the laptops from One Laptop Per Child? Are the organizations related?
http://laptop.org/
@gladys:
But never before have population trends been so dramatic... Everywhere, people are going to have to learn how to live together in very large numbers. Communicating with other members very quickly is essential to this education. We need the Internet and the personal empowerment it brings.
However, I have to agree that there are better ways to aid developing nations.