Cradle to Cradle

A groundbreaking, passionately-argued and visionary call to arms. 'There's an alternative responsible future persuasively offered by Braungart and McDonough. The survival of the planet can be re-stated in terms of stimulus, opportunity, challenge and reward. Works for me.' Stephen BayleyRecycling is good, isn't it?In this visionary book, chemist Michael Braungart and architect William McDonough challenge this status quo and put forward a manifesto for an intriguing and radically different philosophy of environmentalism."Reduce, reuse, recycle". This is the standard "cradle to grave" manufacturing model dating back to the Industrial Revolution that we still follow today. In this thought-provoking read, the authors propose that instead of minimising waste, we should be striving to create value. This is the essence of Cradle to Cradle- waste need not to exist at all. By providing a framework of redesign of everything from carpets to corporate campuses, McDonough and Braungart make a revolutionary yet viable case for change and for remaking the way we make things.

“The best argument for good design is that it lasts. The best argument for good science is that it deplores waste. I'm bored with guilty and technologically illiterate environmental Luddites describing a future of guilt and privation led in caves. There's an alternative responsible future persuasively offered by Braungart and McDonough. The survival of the planet can be re-stated in terms of stimulus, opportunity, challenge and reward. Works for me.”

The best argument for good design is that it lasts. The best argument for good science is that it deplores waste. I'm bored with guilty and technologically illiterate environmental Luddites describing a future of guilt and privation led in caves. There's an alternative responsible future persuasively offered by Braungart and McDonough. The survival of the planet can be re-stated in terms of
stimulus, opportunity, challenge and reward. Works for me.

-- Stephen Bayley
Already embraced by far-thinking manufacturers and governments. Food Ethics Magazine
It's one of the most thought-provoking books I've ever read -- Ellen Macarthur Daily Express
Environmentalists too rarely apply the ecological wisdom of life to our problems. Asking how a cherry tree would design an energy efficient building is only one of the creative 'practices' that McDonough and Braungart spread, like a field of wild flowers, before their readers. This book will give you renewed hope that, indeed, 'it is darkest before the dawn' -- Carl Pope, Executive Director of the Sierra Club
Achieving the great economic transition to more equitable, ecologically sustainable societies requires nothing less than a design revolution - beyond today's fossilized industrialism. This enlightened and enlightening book shows us how - and indeed, that 'God is in the details.' A must for every library and every concerned citizen -- Hazel Henderson, author of "Building a Win-Win World and Beyond Globalization: Shaping a Sustainable Global Economy"

Michael Braungart is a chemist and founder of the Environmental Protection Encouragement Agency (EPEA) in Hamburg. He has been lecturing at universities, businesses and institutions around the world since 1984 on critical new concepts for ecological chemistry, and is the recipient of numerous awards, honours and fellowships.William McDonough is an architect and founding principal of William McDonough + Parners based in Virginia. In 1999, Time magazine recognised him as a 'Hero for our Planet', and in 1996 he received the Presidential Award for Sustainable Development, the highest environmental honour given by the United States.

HOW CAN WE AVOID ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER? Nowadays, most of us recycle. But what about industry, where the real damage is done? Its limited, if well-intentioned, approach, maintains the one-way, 'cradle to grave' manufacturing model of the Industrial Revolution, the very model that creates immense amounts of waste and pollution in the first place. What the planet needs is a major rethink; a new approach which directly combats the problem rather than slowly perpetuating it. And it needs it right now. An exciting, simple groundbreaking new vision, Cradle to Cradle offers this approach. With clear, accessible - even humorous - arguments, celebrated chemist Michael Braungart and inspirational architect William McDonogh challenge the notion that human industry must damage the world. Instead, they look to nature and find a production system which mimics nature's model to our commercial and environmental advantage, a system in which waste equals food. This book's theories will shape our future, and this updated edition is essential reading: a bold, practical and overwhelmingly positive manifesto for our planet's prosperous future.

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