Last year at the 2007 IDEA awards we began to see the influence of the sustainable design movement within the design elite. Sponsored by BusinessWeek and the Industrial Designers Society of America (now international) the IDEA’s have become probably the most prestigious and thought after awards, especially in the industrial design field.

It’s no secret that with the recent rise of green design�, that includes everything from a London skip hire company that is eco friendly to fair trade clothes, environmental impact has become more relevant in the design industry, but it wasn’t until 2006, just two years ago that the society finally decided to include an eco-design category in their annual conference and award event. This might have been influenced by the strong wake up call from the keynote speaker at the 2005 IDSA conference, William McDonough.

Bill was clear and poignant when he brought his 11-year-old son up on stage and pointed out that most of the beautiful “award winning” products sitting on the gallery floor in the next room were actually poisonous to children the users and incompatible with our natural environment. He demanded that we designers must think of not only the present but also the future and that good design must be responsible. He showed clear examples of how we can embrace sustainable design as the future of our industry. He received a standing ovation from the crowd, composed of the cream of the crop of the corporate design world.

The IDSA has come full circle to openly embracing sustainable design since once supposedly banning environmental design legend Victor Papanek from the society for speaking up against the damage that the industrial design profession has done:

There are few professions more harmful than industrial design, but only a very few by creating whole new species of permanent garbage to clutter up the landscape, and by choosing materials and processes that pollute the air we breath, designers have become a dangerous breed. In this age of mass production when everything must be planned and designed, design has become the most powerful tool with which man shapes his tools and environments (and, by extension, society and himself). This demands high social and moral responsibility from the designer.”

This year, there was a stronger showing in the eco-design category although personally I feel that we as professionals are still just starting to understand our influence and responsibility in the pursuit of a sustainable future. We have the right tools and skills to easily incorporate these values into our design process, but it’s really about the definition of good design.

These type of design awards are great because they bring awareness and communicate these great examples but hopefully in the future we wont need an eco-category in the industries most important design awards because any design good enough to be recognized with an award, must be good not only for the bottom line but also beneficial to society and our environment. Here are the standouts from this year..

- GreenAir is a low-cost, space-efficient air purification system that uses plants to reduce toxins in the air.

- The Steward Waterless Urinal offers many benefits over standard fixtures incorporating water-saving features without sacrificing performance.

- The Enermax Package offers an environmentally friendly solution to battery packaging using 100 percent craftboard in a simple, straightforward tubular design.

-The Mountain Sneaker is a part of the Greenscapes Collection, a line of casual footwear and apparel that uses earth-conscious materials and construction methods without sacrificing style and function.

-Roll n Roll are portable, personal chopsticks that give people an environmentally responsible, sanitary tableware alternative when in public. They are made of a thin metal slice that can be rolled vertically to form a straw or chopstick, or a wrist like a bracelet.

- The Epic Spray System is a more ecologically sensitive spray-paint system that uses disposable plastic paint bags and carbon dioxide as a propellant.