Sustainable Papers, Printers, and How to Evaluate Climate Solutions
A small rest week ft. curated resources to take some of the overwhelm out of figuring out what's "most sustainable" as a designer.
Studio Updates and Ramblings
I’ve been just taking time to slow down the last week–pacing things differently than normal. I’ve been doing some subcontract design work for a dear friend and learning Figma while I’m at it (under her skilled instruction). It’s allowed me a strangely flexible work schedule where I found myself taking days off in the week randomly and comfortably working at 9pm on a Saturday. I can’t say I mind truly leaning into a flexible schedule that still meets deadlines and expectations but also somewhat caters to what feels best at the moment for me.
I didn’t have an exciting idea for this Substack. There’s some great ideas I have in the pipeline but the inspiration for writing them just feels a like it’ll hit me on Wednesday or Thursday this week and I am in need of a little more recharge time this week. Personal art projects have been grabbing my interest first and foremost. I’ve (responsibly) harvested some lichen and bought ammonia (I felt very sketchy buying ammonia and rubbing alcohol in the drugstore) to add to it to start the fermentation process to produce a purple dye. The process takes about 2 months, I can’t wait to see how it turns out.
Another version of myself would have deeply pushed to come out with a full essay but after last year, I’ve learned it’s better to let myself rest a bit. Instead, I wanted to collect some of the excellent resources I’ve found over the years for Green Graphic Design and post them here so you can peruse them, especially if you’ve not stumbled across them yet! These are all resources I reference fairly regularly :)
Hope you still enjoy this slightly lighter Substack this week!
CANOPY
International Eco-Friendly Paper Stock Database
The first resource to mention is Canopy's Eco-Paper Database: this list has THOUSANDS of international stock options that are ranked by eco-friendly standards. It's really awesome and is routinely updated every year. To be honest, I was going to make one myself, but Canopy's got me beat and I love using it.
CANOPY
Most Sustainable Printers in North America
The next awesome resource is in the same vein: Canopy doesn't just rank Paper Stocks, but they rank printers as well! Unfortunately, these printers are all in North America, and this ranking isn't international at this time, but it's a great starting spot for finding a printer if you're on the NA continent!
A BETTER SOURCE
Sustainable Packaging Suppliers
Looking for some awesome packaging resources for sustainable design? Look no further than A Better Source! While some of these solutions are a bit experimental and appropriate only for clients with huge budgets, there's a lot of awesome inspiration and also a range of smaller-scale suppliers as well.
CANOPY
Ever Wanted to Know the Environmental Impact of your Paper Project?
Canopy once again has you covered.
The Paper Calculator is a publicly available web-based tool which allows users to calculate and compare the estimated environmental impacts of different paper choices using a science-based methodology grounded in life cycle assessment (LCA). LCA is a tool that can be used to assess the environmental impacts associated with the life cycle of a product, from raw material extraction and processing to the end-of-life phase. LCA provides a unique, quantified approach for comparing the environmental performance of different sources of fiber.
DRAWDOWN
World’s Leading Resource for Climate Solutions
If you're interested in learning a bit more about different climate solutions, I recommend exploring the Drawdown website a bit–it ranks every viable solution to combat climate crisis and ranks its efficiency for carbon sequestration, how much it will cost to implement, the savings long-term if it's implemented, and some of the policy and procedure that will reflect a successful implementation of each solution. It's a fun page to peruse and myth-bust some crazy climate solutions like recycling, direct carbon capture, and biochar. And be surprised by some of the most effective ones!
CLEAN CREATIVES
The Future of Creativity is Clean
I also want to include Clean Creatives in this mix, because they’re doing really excellent work in exposing the agencies that work to grow fossil fuel companies through effective marketing campaigns. This shit should be named and shamed and that’s exactly what this organization is about. They also have a pledge you can sign to promise you won’t work with evil companies but honestly, a pledge doesn’t really mean anything :) I still want to draw attention to their work because it’s excellent.
I also highly recommend checking out their research into specific campaigns and how they mislead: this is valuable to dissect for all designers. You can figure out how to construct an effective campaign but also how to identify greenwashing in one go! Maybe in another issue I’ll detail some of them because I think this kind of reading and research is invaluable to us as green designers. You can never be too careful with knowing how to vet clients or projects and understanding how these campaigns and misinformation pieces work helps you to recognize the subtle red flags when they happen.
Have you been working on any projects that have been either lighting you up or feeling particularly draining? I’d love to listen to your random vent or your excited ramble. :) Design isn’t all wonderful projects all the time after all.
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Reading: I read a bunch of manga but nothing of remarkable note.
Watching: Snow White with the Red Hair
Listening: Japanese 80s CityPop! It’s hitting the right summertime nostalgia vibes. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, Plastic Love and Mayonaka no Door / Stay With Me are all-time-classics.
Some Bonus Things You May or May Not Want to Check Out
The Strandline: My personal Substack where I post about my art, naturalist things like birding, marine biology, and plant-based ink experiments.
Our YouTube Channel: For free webinar replays discussing green graphic design, studio politics, sustainable packaging and more.
The Green Graphic Design Course: For further education on Green Graphic Design, our complete educational offer (use code: SUBSTACK for 10% off).
KUDOS for not pushing yourself :) Figma had been on my "to learn list" forever and then when Adobe snatched them up, I thought there'd be no point if they were gonna k1ll it off but it's still going strong so bad decision on my part. Keep us posted on how you're finding it!