Design Declares has always been about people. From the moment that Design Council CDO Cat Drew introduced Alexie Sommer and Jo Barnard back in 2022, followed by Abb-d Taiyo and Aurelie Lionet coming onboard and aligning to the vision, we knew Design Declares was something special.

To a sold out room, Sarah Booth, Director of Impact at the Design Council, set the scene perfectly. Shockingly 71% of designers have worked on projects designing for environmental impact in the past 12 months, yet only 43% of them feel equipped to do so. This is the skills gap we need to fill. Of course, it’s not only about designers. Yes, 80% of the impact of a product or service is determined at the design stage, but it’s not just designers making decisions; they need to bring stakeholders on the journey too. And more so, a big part of that is knowing how to talk about sustainability better.

Tom Lloyd brought his humility and experience to the room, sharing how his practice has changed over the years as they have become more aware of what it means to make sustainable products. It’s so easy to look back at work that you’ve done in the past with the knowledge you subsequently learn, and wish you had made different decisions at the time. But if anything, that is the feeling we should strive for, because that means progress is being made.

Next up was Andy Galloway from the New Citizen Project, with the assertion that “If we want design to be a force for climate action, we have to design for citizens, not consumers”. The ideas of New Citizen Project founder Jon Alexander really hit home. In his book, Jon challenges this idea of consumption, showing how we might shake off this consumer title and make our way back to the role of citizen. Andy brought that to a design audience by explaining ways in which we can make design more participatory, bringing people into the design process and making it less about the product at the end and more about the journey itself.

From one engaging young speaker to another, Priya Prakash stormed the room with her pothole anecdotes. Taking us on a journey of examples of projects and provocations in the world of service design, we looked at how we might design both for nature, and with nature. Sharing her journey in trying to make Nature a recognised religion - because as soon as something is associated with a religion it can’t be ignored - and leaving us with the lessons: Ask why, play seriously and learn to adapt, Priya left the room full of such energy and positivity we quite forgot the hard benches we were sat on.

The bar has certainly been set for future Design Declares events.

Designing for people and planet

Design Declares

Read the unabridged deep dive into the Design Declares event this June!