Making Design Circular Podcast – Season 4 – Minnie Moll

Welcome to season four of Making Design Circular with Katie Treggiden, in which we’re exploring what it takes to cultivate a creative practice in which you, your business and the planet ALL get to thrive. We’ll be diving deep into the nuances, complexities and mindset shifts that we need to embrace to bring about a just transition to a more circular economy.

In this episode, Katie talks to Minnie Moll, Chief Executive at the Design Council. Minnie spent years in innovation, design, advertising and brand consultancy. She was Managing Partner of HHCL, the ‘Advertising Agency of the decade’ and then Global Marketing Director of Innovation company? What If!, which won Great Place to Work Institute’s ‘Best Place to Work in the UK’ two years running.  Minnie was voted Vistage UK Business Leader of the Year in 2020. Always a purpose driven business leader, she has proved you can do well and do good. While Joint Chief Executive of the East of England Co-op, they won Alzheimer’s Society ‘Large Business of the Year’ in 2016. That year she was appointed by HRH Prince Charles as his Ambassador for Responsible Business in the East of England. She has passion for place making and has been a board member of two Business Improvement Districts and a Town Deals Board.

Minnie has a First-Class Degree in Creative Arts. She is also a qualified Transformational Coach. When she’s not working, Minnie can be found animal wrangling and driving her 1952 little grey Fergie tractor.

During this episode Katie speaks to Minnie about how she came to join the Desing Council in 2021 and her involvement with their rebrand and new vision, mission and values which now fully align with ensuring environmental issues are at the heart of everything. We find out more about the 2023 Design for Planet Festival, now in its 3^rd year. To find out more about the upcoming Design for Planet Festival, at which Katie with be in conversation with TOAST communications manages Madeleine Mitchell, head here: https://www.designcouncil.org.uk/our-events/design-for-planet-festival/

You can connect with Minnie and The Design Council here:

The Design Council website: designcouncil.org.uk

The Design Council Twitter: https://twitter.com/designcouncil

The Design Council Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/designcouncil/

The Design Council LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/design-council/

Minnie Moll Twitter: https://twitter.com/minniethemoll

Minnie Moll LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/minnie-moll/

 

Here are some episode highlights:

Why Design for Planet?

“I think the biggest area that we’ve worked in (over the past 2 years) has been what I’d call, curating and convening. So a big, big focus on designers and commissioners of design. We knew that, following research, that of the 1.97 million people working in design in this country, a massive majority said, I really want to design for planet and I don’t really know that I have all the right skills and tools to do so. So a lot of our focus in the last two years has been on galvanising and supporting designers. The key thing that we’ve done has been our Design for Planet festival, we did the first one in the in support of COP, that was held in Glasgow in 2021. And then we held the second one last year with Northumbria University. And that’s been about bringing together thought leaders, really inspiring people working in design, some of them at the very cutting edge of thinking, some of them that are actually really making a difference in the organisations that they’re in. So that sense of bringing in evidence, inspiration for designers, you know, we can do this.”

Intelligent Collision

“And I think there’s also a sense of one of the one of the values of making design circular is collaboration over competition. And I think there’s a sense isn’t there, that the sort of apprentice style of doing business, it’s all about winning because someone else is losing, whereas I think to solve this problem, we have to work together. We need scientists and techie people and strategists, but we also need designers and we need to plug design into those spaces that perhaps it hasn’t always had a voice in…. And one of my favourite phrases is intelligent collision. So it’s almost, the more unlikely the partnership, probably the more dynamic it will be. And the sense of intelligent collision between architects, fashion designers, engineers, scientists, boy if there was ever a time for us to come together, and work in a collaborative way it’s now.”

Design can be regenerative

“We are acutely aware that a regenerative world for all is a quite out there, far reaching vision, you know, that’s not a five-year vision, that’s it, I probably won’t be here, kind of vision. But we feel so passionately that that is what we have to be shooting for. Because if you take the meaning of sustainability, sort of literally the sense of sustaining, we do not want to sustain floods, drought, catastrophic, biodiversity loss, you know, so you don’t sustain that. And so this point that acknowledging that we have so depleted and so broken, some of the really important systems, we have to be looking for every opportunity where design can be regenerative”

 

Books, podcasts and articles we mentioned:

The Infinite Game by Simon Sinek

Material Matters Podcast by Grant Gibson

The Light We Carry by Michelle Obama

Dolly Parton’s America Podcast

Tiny data centre used to heat public swimming pool

Broken: Mending and repair in a throwaway world

Katie’s sixth book celebrates 25 artists, curators, menders and re-makers who have rejected the allure of the fast, disposable and easy in favour of the patina of use, the stories of age and the longevity of care and repair. Accompanying these profiles, six in-depth essays explore the societal, cultural and environmental roles of mending in a throwaway world.

Cultivating Hope, 3 part mini course: Are you ready to cultivate hope in the face of the climate crisis? Sign up to Katie’s three-part free mini course that will help you move through feelings of helplessness, reconnect with nature and take aligned action.

Making Design Circular membership: An international membership community and online learning platform for environmentally conscious designers, makers artists and craftspeople – join us!

 

Spread the Word:

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About Katie:
Katie Treggiden is the founder and director of Making Design Circular – an international membership community and online learning platform for environmentally conscious designers, makers artists and craftspeople. She is also an author, journalist and podcaster championing a hopeful approach to environmentalism. With more than 20 years’ experience in the creative industries, she regularly contributes to publications such as The Guardian, The Observer, Crafts Magazine and Dezeen. She is currently exploring the question ‘Can craft save the world?’ through her sixth book, Broken: Mending & Repair in a Throwaway World (Ludion, 2023), this very podcast.

Below is a transcript of our conversation. Find the full episode available to listen on Spotify here.

 

INTRO

Welcome to season four of Making Design Circular with Katie Treggiden, in which we’re exploring what it takes to cultivate a creative practice in which you, your business and the planet ALL get to thrive. We’ll be diving deep into the nuances, complexities and mindset shifts that we need to embrace to bring about a just transition to a more circular economy.

 

PODCAST SNIPPET

We are acutely aware that a regenerative world for all is a quite out there, far reaching vision, you know, that’s not a five year vision, that’s it, I probably won’t be here, kind of vision. But we feel so passionately that that is what we have to be shooting for. Because if you take the meaning of sustainability, sort of literally the sense of sustaining, we do not want to sustain floods, drought, catastrophic, biodiversity loss, you know, so you don’t sustain that. And so this point that acknowledging that we have so depleted and so broken, some of the really important systems, we have to be looking for every opportunity where design can be regenerative.

 

EPISODE INTRO

Welcome to the first episode of season four and you will have noticed a slight name change. We’re moving from Circular with Katie Treggiden to Making Design Circular with Katie Treggiden, and that is to bring the podcast under the same umbrella as the membership and the online learning platform and all of those sorts of things, so I’m excited about that. Slight rebrand on its way, all of that good stuff. And I’m very excited about today’s guest, I first met Minnie Moll at the London Design Festival 2001. So this conversation has been a long time coming. But I was so excited by her vision for the Design Council. I believe that design is about solving problems, and that the environmental crisis is perhaps the biggest problem humanity has ever faced and I think Minnie agrees. And we were talking about what on earth is design for if not for solving that problem. And that is absolutely at the heart of the Design Council’s vision. And I’m really excited to share this brilliant conversation that I had with Minnie, with you.

 

PODCAST INTERVIEW

Katie Treggiden 

Well, I am so excited to have you on the podcast Minnie because I met you in September, at London Design Festival. And I can remember there was a real buzz around about the fact that you joined the Design Council and your plans. And everybody was saying to me, you’ve got to meet Minnie, you’ve got to meet Minnie. And the moment I met you, I was just like, yes. This is exciting. So can you start by just introducing yourself and giving us a bit of background as to how you came to join the Design Council as chief executive in what I think was March 2021.

 

Minnie Moll 

Yeah, exactly. Right. Well, how interesting because I was thinking about this earlier, and very fitting for today, it really does feel that I’ve come full circle, because my degree was in creative arts and after that, I then spent, I think, looked back at the first half of my career was in brand, design, innovation, marcoms, etc. So the first half, then I went to the dark side as a client and was a retail business leader for a sort of a fairly big chapter I realise now looking back at it, and then it really felt like it was the right time for me to be leaving retail, where, let’s face it quite a lot of the time, you are still selling more stuff to people and driving consumerism, albeit the brand that was working, I was working for at the time, it’s very quality, lasting stuff. And this little red square just kept jumping up and down on LinkedIn, the Design Council, and I was intrigued, and I found out more and got into the, you know, applied and got in, but it really does looking back feel like I’ve come full circle back into the heart of creative industries.

 

Katie Treggiden 

And it’s so interesting, isn’t it how that happens. I wanted to be a writer from the age of five and made a massive detour also into advertising, branding, marcoms, etc and eventually found my way back. So Steve Jobs says, you can only connect the dots looking backwards, right, which I think is so often very true. But we met on a beautifully sunny day, that September, so six months after you joined the London Design Festival, and I can remember you telling me that you were putting environmental issues at the heart of the Design Council’s mission. And I might be paraphrasing here, but you said something along the lines of what on earth are any of us doing in this industry otherwise, and I can just remember that being music to my ears, because designing systems solve problems, right. And I cannot think of a more pressing or complex problem than the climate crisis. But why does all of this matter to you personally, why was that so important to put that at the heart of the Design Council’s mission.

 

Minnie Moll 

So well, one thing very, very personal is I have 24 year old identical twin daughters, Daisy and Scarlet, who are appalled at the state that the planet in is in, thanks to my generation and others, they’re vegetarian, they have got their own sustainability fashion brand. And they really inspire me to do better, and to personally do what I can do to leave a more positive future for them. So there’s a very personal thing there. Also, reflecting I do think so much is formed when your a kid and I grew up on a boat. And this is one again, one of those hindsight things I grew up on a boat and when everything has got to be brought onto the boat, like water, you grow up not wasting water. I mean, we really did put water into kind of a mug to, you know, you didn’t just turn the tap on. And that notion of kind of scarcity. But also my parents, I also now look back and think you know, they were they were passionate about nature. They were passionate, they were of a generation where they didn’t waste anything. You know, you mum still darned my father’s welly boot socks. Amazing. You know, when we grew up in the country where people collect jam jars, you don’t chuck jars in the bin you give them to someone who’s making jam. Yeah, collect, you save all your egg boxes and you give them back to someone who’s got chickens. And so, so there was a lot in my upbringing that made a lot of the stuff that we’re now thinking about and talking about very, very, very natural. And then coming to your point about when we met and Design Council when I joined, there were three legs to the stool in terms of the strategy, that Design Council and sustainability was one of them. And I had this sense that slightly the elephant in the room, the climate crisis is so huge we have to put all of our energies into it, not kind of 1/3 of our time.

 

Katie Treggiden 

And also I think so many of the problems that we face are intertwined with the climate crisis, right? Yeah, you can sort of look at inequality and racism and kind of all these other big issues, but actually, they’re all intertwined with the, you know, the same things that are causing the climate crisis are also causing those issues. So yeah, health and right absolutely.

 

Minnie Moll 

Yeah. So that sense, that, that sent that sense of really being focused, and really trying to get momentum around it, is why we then we launched the Design for Planet mission.

 

Katie Treggiden 

And how has that, I mean, we’re gonna dig into this in a lot more detail, but give us a top line of how that kind of putting environmentalism at the heart has manifested itself over the two years that you’ve been there.

 

Minnie Moll 

I think the biggest area that we’ve worked in has been what I’d call, curating and convening. So a big, big focus on designers and commissioners of design, we knew that of the 1.97 million people working in design in this country, nearly 2 million people, we did some research and they basically said, I really want to design for planet and truth, I don’t really know I that I have all the right skills and tools. So this, a lot of our focus in the last two years has been on galvanising and supporting designers. The key thing that we’ve done has been are Design for Planet festival, we did the first one in the in support of COP in that was held in Glasgow that year in 21. And then we held the second one last year with Northumbria University. And that’s been about bringing together thought leaders, really inspiring people working in design, some of them at the very cutting edge of thinking some of them that are in in it actually really making a difference in the organisations that they’re in. So that sense of bringing in evidence, inspiration for designers, you know, we can do this. So that’s been one of the biggies. There’s a couple of other things around that. Alex, my colleague has set up a meet up, a monthly meet up, that’s got over 600 people in it members, as members of that now. And that’s a Design for Planet meet up once a month. And it’s three people speaking just for about 10 minutes, it’s idea sharing inspiration, again, building that sense of, of community. The other key area I’d say has been around skills and tools, we launched a systemic design framework, which expands on the Double Diamond framework to really think about how you adapt that design framework to apply it to huge issues like the climate crisis.

 

Katie Treggiden 

I think, I think that’s really interesting. I think something the Design Council has always been really good at, is providing the evidence that design works. And that’s something that I’ve been sort of fascinated by throughout my entire career. I’ve got various of your reports on those bookshelves behind me. And I think, I think particularly in the climate crisis, because I think one of the biggest barriers is the belief that we can’t do this. So I think the more and more evidence that we can share that actually this design intervention is helping in this way. And this design intervention is helping us that will inspire other people to sort of keep hope. And therefore keep working.

 

Minnie Moll 

Yeah. And just on that one of the things that we felt very strongly about when we launched the Design for Planet mission, we have to be hopeful and positive. We have to be hopeful and positive. And there are some days when you hear new data from the climate scientists, it can be hard. Yeah. And when you just see that we’re just not moving as fast as we really should be it can be dispiriting but we need to stay positive. Yeah,

 

Katie Treggiden 

Absolutely. And I’ve actually just put together a free three part mini course on how to cultivate hope in the face of the climate crisis because I think unless we can believe that we’re going to do this stuff. We’re not going to do it. You know, the first step is that we have to believe it’s possible. And I actually love, I was having to dig around on your website and came across your values. And I love how beautifully they overlap with the values of Making Design Circular, which is the membership community I love. So in inspire possibility is one of them, which really speaks to that, that idea of hope. And then you’ve also got powerful together and boundless curiosity, would you mind talking us through those in turn, because I think they’re really, they’re really in themselves, those combination of words are really inspiring.

 

Minnie Moll 

Happily, happily, I think, when we were, because we had values at the Design Council, but they, they needed to be looked at again, and made really relevant for the for the people here. So we did this is very much a collaborative process. And with each one, we were thinking about it working for us, as individuals, colleagues, when we’re working together, how are we going to be with each other? How are we going to be with the design community in the UK? And then always, how are we going to be more expansively, you know, kind of with the  world at large. And so the first one powerful together from a start point, and this is not just about Design for Planet, you know, this is, first of all about designers, we still have to do so much work to get people to understand design, that it isn’t just handbags.

 

Katie Treggiden 

Which you forget, I think when you’re in the industry, you sort of we’ve got shorthand for what we mean by these things. And then you talk to like your mom or grandma or or, you know, someone who works in a different industry, and absolutely designer handbags are always the thing people think of.

 

Minnie Moll 

And it’s just the way things look. And so there’s a lot of work to be done there. So this sense that 1.97 million of us, you know, the more we can be and Design Council’s role to be the voice of design. So this sense of us being more powerful together it really though plays out in the context of the Design for Planet mission because it’s, you know, the climate crisis knows no boundaries by country, or it really is a global crisis. So actually, some of the interesting work we’ve done in the last year has been International, it we’ve held some international roundtables, and really reaching out and connecting with designers across the world so we can all charge each other’s batteries, and share ideas and evidence. So there’s this sense of a powerful together, globally.

 

Katie Treggiden 

And I think there’s also a sense of one of the one of the values of making design circular is collaboration over competition. And I think there’s a sense isn’t that the sort of apprentice style of doing business, it’s all about winning because someone else is losing, where I think to solve this problem, we have to work together and and we need scientists and techie people and strategists. But we also need designers and we need to plug design into those spaces that perhaps it hasn’t always had a voice in. And that that sort of speaks to me in that sense as well.

 

Minnie Moll 

Oh I could not agree more. And one of my favourite phrases is intelligent collision. I love that. So I love that. So this absolutely the almost the more unlikely the partnership, probably the more dynamic it will be. And the sense of intelligent collision between architects, fashion designers, engineers, scientists, boy if there was ever a time for us to come together, and work in a collaborative way it’s now.

 

Katie Treggiden 

I love that intelligent collision. It’s nice, isn’t it? Yeah. Nice. So then the next one is boundless curiosity.

 

Minnie Moll 

Yeah so the spirit of inquiry, the asking the right questions, you all have those kinds of coaching quite questions of yeah and what else? And how could this be extraordinary? And, and, and so the curiosity piece as well as for us, speaks to the notion of diversity and inclusion.

 

Katie Treggiden 

I always say that curiosity is the antidote to judgement.

 

Minnie Moll 

Yeah, lovely. Oh, that’s, that’s thank you. I’m having that one. Swapsies. Because yes, with the more the more diverse the opinions that we seek, and the people that in terms of our curiosity and trying to bring them into the conversation, so that yeah, that’s, that’s and boundless, boundless, again, across borders, across borders. And so our boundless curiosity should explicitly mean, what are they doing in Korea about this? How are the Scandinavians doing this? So that spirit of inquiry to make sure our colleagues are looking up and out.

 

Katie Treggiden 

And to your previous point across disciplines as well, and across disciplines as well? Yeah, yeah. And then inspire possibility which brings us right back to this idea of hope.

 

Minnie Moll 

It really does. We have to inspire what if, what could be, when we need to support it with evidence where we can we talk about the Design Council always aspiring to be really catalytic, you know, in our partnerships and client relationships, how can we be really catalytic in that organisation, to get them to think differently about how they can harness design as the creative problem solver that it is. So and then there’s one of the things I love about this is, so how does that make me behave with my colleagues, when I come to work? We, you know, go into a meeting and say, Hey, what about, have you seen this amazing show? So that sense of constantly trying to Yeah, try try and inspire each other around what we could do.

 

Katie Treggiden 

Yeah it’s that sort of can do attitude. Yeah, I had the great honour of being at Marcus Fairs memorial service and somebody was telling a story, how people would come up with these crazy ideas and Marcus would just go might be fun, let’s give it a go. And so, you know there’s this sense that  you know, you can imagine a lot of people running a business saying there’s no ROI, it’s going to take up too much staff time. And apparently, Marcus would always just say, sounds like fun, let’s give it a go. Which I think is just that sense of possibility, isn’t it, it’s let’s try and see.

 

Minnie Moll 

And you’re gonna get really specific about that, then, you know, innovation. It’s it is it’s, let’s do that fail fast learn. And there’s a fabulous quote from from someone who spoke at our last Design for Planet festival and how about how we have to move from protest to prototype. Oh, isn’t that lovely? Now, we really need to move from protest to prototype. Love it again, that spirit of let’s give it a go. Let’s make it real. Let’s try it.

 

Katie Treggiden 

Yeah, let’s move from the problems to the solutions. Yeah, yeah, I love that. So the Design Council’s vision is a regenerative world for all. And I just want to read the explanation for that on your website. So it says Our vision is for a world where design works as a force that restores, renews and revitalizes. Regenerative in every sense for people, planets, and economic health, sustainability will no longer be enough if we are to rebalance and live in harmony with the Earth’s finite resources. Design is at the heart of the transformation we need to make systemic and system shifting Design for Planet is our first step towards this vision. So could you dig into all of that a little bit more because, again, that sounds really exciting.

 

Minnie Moll 

Yeah, so we are acutely aware that a regenerative world for all is a quite out there, far reaching vision, you know, that’s not a five year vision, that’s it, I probably won’t be here, kind of vision. But we feel so passionately that that is what we have to be shooting for. Because if you take the meaning of sustainability, sort of literally the sense of sustaining, we do not want to sustain floods, drought, catastrophic, biodiversity loss, you know, so you don’t sustain that. And so this point that acknowledging that we have so depleted and so broken, some of the really important systems, we have to be looking for every opportunity where design can be regenerative. So we’re well aware, it’s a long, a long shot, vision. And there are certain projects one might work on where, you know, you just need to focus on design for planet you just need to focus on right here right now , Net Zero improvements, but we’ve got to keep our eye on the bigger, longer term, prize. I because I live in the country. And one of the things that a lot of people forget, you know, it’s just if you take bees, you know, there are many scientists who would say, if, if we lose bees, we’re more surely dead than doing nothing about the climate crisis. You know, it’s just one species. You know, it’s a real issue. So the biodiversity piece, you know, with regenerative, the designing with nature, and for nature becomes really, really heightened. And we mustn’t lose sight of that and actually, Net Zero, having the net zero target it’s great, it’s galvanising, but I think what it does is it makes us so we fall into the trap of being so carbon focused because of the net zero banner is too easy to forget about the nature biodiversity issue, and we will never really truly achieve net zero if we don’t have nature.

 

Katie Treggiden 

Absolutely, absolutely. Because the the natural systems are such an important part of the carbon systems. So yeah, I think I think it’s dangerous, isn’t it? Because of course we have to hit net zero. But then what, you know we’ve got to at some point become carbon negative and start putting sort of actively taking carbon out of the atmosphere, you know, ultimately, we ought to be moving towards a carbon negative position, and regenerating the systems that helped to make that possible. But I think it’s really interesting that you talk about that as being a goal that you might not achieve within your lifetime. Because there’s a there’s a book that I talk about a lot called the infinite game by Simon Sinek. And he talks about a just cause, and one of the criteria for just causes that you can’t do it on your own, and you can’t do it within your lifetime. And I think actually, that moves us away from this, this zero sum game of who wins and who loses, because it’s not about what I’m going to achieve. It’s about what we’re going to achieve and the movements that we’re building, which you know, that’s the legacy you want to leave for your daughters. Right. Is that this exactly, this movement, exactly. Which is, yeah, really important. So you mentioned the design for Planet festival. And the next iteration is in October with the University of East Anglia. Can you tell us a little bit about kind of what’s coming up and why it’s important and why people should be interested?

 

Minnie Moll 

Yeah. So for context, we have done two, we’ve delivered the two festivals so far. And this third one is at the University of East Anglia, up in Norwich, which has a fantastic climate science heritage, amongst other things, it’s fabulous uni, it happens to be sort of my neck of the woods East Anglia as well, which is rather wonderful. We got some really interesting people sort of lined up already, but I won’t tempt fate and share any of them. But suffice to say, for anyone who was involved in the last two, we’re getting a really good global mix of people, design leaders, sustainability leaders, it’s two core days, it’s online, as well as for a smaller group, unfortunately, only about 120-140 will be there present in Norwich, just to give a sense of scale, the last one in November just gone. We had over 6000 people subscribe from 88 countries, which we thought was pretty incredible. And so it’s really built, built its audience each time, we aim to have as many of the sessions live as possible. A small number will be have to be pre recorded, but won’t be many. So that there is that opportunity for furring involvement, and put it in your diaries, people, it is the 17th and 18th of October, we’re doing it a bit ahead of COP this year, and put it in your diaries, it’s just two days to really be immersed in some fantastic content.

 

Katie Treggiden 

We’ll put a link in the show notes as well so that people can find out more. And something I love doing with those is actually stepping away from my desk and my husband has what we what we call a boy room, I wish we had a better name for it, but a space with a big TV and a load of games and stuff that he likes to do. So I book out the boy room for the days of the digital conference and kind of treat it as if I’m actually there. You know, let’s take a lunch break. And because I think when you try and watch these things at your desk, you inevitably get distracted. So yeah, I would encourage folks to not only put it in their diaries, but also see if they can find a space where they’re not going to be disturbed and they can kind of really immerse in it. And I love that it’s available digitally because I think a lot of those things were available during lockdown and during the pandemic and have now gone back to live. Actually, that’s less accessible for a lot of people and so the the kind of virtual offering, I think it’s really helpful for people who can’t be there live for a number of reasons.

 

Minnie Moll 

Yeah, yeah. And what happened, what happened with the last one nightmare was there was a rail strike, so we ended up not being able to do the in person in Northumbria. We were strike trains, trains, booked everything. And we did reflect on the fact that when you aren’t focusing on digital as your larger audience, it does mean that you’re thinking about the virtual audience, but they’re not watching something where you really should be in the room. So I think it helped and we had to two strands running in parallel. And yeah, I think I think it forces you to think about how you curate the event when you know the larger audience are online.

 

Katie Treggiden 

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I think that’s so important. For so many reasons, you know, people with disabilities, people with financial restraints, people with sort of mental health problems and learning differences, I think there’s so many reasons that a virtual offering is really, really powerful. So the other exciting thing that has just happened is you’ve just finished judging the makeup design circular awards. I would love to hear a little bit about the awards and then some of your key takeouts from the judging process.

 

Minnie Moll 

Yeah. So what a privilege to be asked to be one of the judges. For people who don’t know about it, it’s it’s a global award. So, and there was something or there were over 20 judges I think so really, really good spread of judges probably more like 30 or 40 judges. And we have to, I had 25 entries. I think every judge had 25 entries. And I’m not quite sure what the total number of entries was but the quality was fantastic. So it’s making circular so you really, you’ve there, there were entries that were about systems and this wouldn’t give anything away to say, no surprise that there were some entries that were around kind of circular food systems. That’s something we desperately need to crack. There were quite a few of the kind of upcycling, particularly quite a lot around fashion. Lots of interesting versions of upcycling, a lot around materiality and one of the one of the themes that really popped for me, so it was a lot about you know, recycling wool, recycling materials, making different new materials out of old materials etc. But I was delighted to see that there were quite a lot of entries that were looking at biomaterials. I mean that has to be one of the big things we’re considering, doesn’t it? And what intrigued me and this is not giving anything away because I knew about this anyway, mycelium mushroom in effect. We’ve known for ages you can make quite resilient material out of a mycelium. You can make quite resilient, resilient material out of kombucha, as you can with coffee. And so there were a number of projects that had this kind of materiality, biomaterial core. And I’m thinking, why is this just not scaling? Why are there all these small startups from places around the world kind of, you know, making the kombucha material in their bath. Why is this not scaling? And they’re the kind of big questions that we’ve got to really ask. I suspect it’s because of the huge investment, sunk investment of big manufacturers in their existing factories and processes.

That’s going to be a huge part of it, you know, that they’re invested in legacy. Yeah. But you know, we really need to look at it because actually, the real shifts are going to happen when we have got big businesses starting to make the things we’re using every day, out of out of biomaterials.

 

Katie Treggiden 

Yeah. I think material innovation is such an important part of this whole conversation. And I must give a shout out to a fellow podcaster Grant Gibson, who runs a podcast called Material Matters. And he’s really digging into some of this stuff. So I think, yeah, there’s some really some really interesting innovation stuff going on there.

 

AD BREAK

I want to use this opportunity of a little sort of mini ad break of sorts to tell you about three things that I think you might be interested in. The first is my latest book Broken: Mending and repair in a throwaway world, which came out in May 2023, with Ludion the publisher of my last four books, and I’m so excited about it. Jay blades was kind enough to write the foreword, and it explores the role of mending and repair in a world where we don’t really need to mend anymore. So I’m looking at the social and cultural roles that mending is playing. And those include mending as restoration of function, which you might sort of immediately think of when you think of repair, but also repair a storytelling repair as activism, repair as healing, and even the regeneration of natural systems as a form of repair. It profiles 28, amazing menders, fixers, hackers, remakers, curators and artists. And it is the book I’m the most proud of so far. And I know I always say that, but I really am, it came out of my research at Oxford and I think it makes an important and new contribution to the field of writing on repair. So if you want to get your hands on a copy, the link is in the show notes.

 

I would also love to tell you about a free resource I have created called cultivating hope in the face of the environmental crisis. And the reason I have made this freely available is because I think it’s so important. If we don’t believe that change is possible and if we don’t believe we have some agency in bringing about that change, we won’t act. So cultivating hope is a three part mini course that’s all delivered direct to your inbox. And it helps you to move through feelings of despair and hopelessness. It helps you to reconnect with nature and that sort of brilliant effect that we know natural spaces have on our wellbeing. And it helps you to start taking aligned action. So if the relentless news cycle has got you feeling, kind of feeling all the doom and gloom, then check that out. Again, the link is in the show notes.

 

And finally, I want to tell you about making design circular the membership. So if you are a designer, a maker, an artist or a crafts person, and you feel drawn to sustainability, regeneration, environmentalism, whatever you want to call it, this is for you. It is an online membership community of brilliant, gorgeous, imperfect souls who have come together to try to make progress in this area. And it’s all built around the idea that you can pour into yourself and take care of yourself and pour into your creative practice and your expression and exploration of creativity and pour into your business and turn all of this or keep all this as a profitable business and benefit the planet. And we want all of those things in alignment so that pouring into any one of them benefits the others and that’s what the membership is built around. The strapline is rewild your creative practice so that you your business and the planets can thrive. So if that sounds like something that you need in your life, again, the link is in the show notes. All right, well, I will hand you back over to this fabulous conversation. Thank you.

 

MAIN PODCAST

Right now I’m gonna get super nerdy, because you and I both have a background in branding and design. So the Design Council has recently undergone its first rebrand since the 90s, which I was quite staggered to discover by OPM studio, which apart from involving my very favourite typeface has undergone a full sustainability and accessibility audit carried out by Mia Allahs, who is the design lead on gov.uk at the government’s digital service. Now I understand what an accessibility audit would look like for a set of brand guidelines. But I am intrigued by the concept of a sustainability audit for a brand because a brand feels really intangible and nebulous, like something that wouldn’t have a massive sustainability or environmental impact. So could you tell us a little bit about that process and kind of what some of the findings were?

 

Minnie Moll 

Yeah, so we knew that just generally most of us don’t really think about the environment carbon impact of digital kind of data. I think this sense of the cloud, we think it is all just sort of floaty, but the reality, of course, is the cloud is in effect made up of a whole load of physical data centres with humongous great big servers, massive air conditioning units, and here’s a little circular thing I heard about. I know that Microsoft have been testing putting this out their servers and on the bottom of the North Sea. My husband told me the other day about a Lido, and I think it might be an East Anglia that’s in outside swimming pool. Yes. I heard about this heating, heating the water for the swimming pool by using the heat generated by the servers, yes, yes. Wonderful. I love it. Love it. And that just came up the other day, a quick aside.

 

Katie Treggiden 

We’ll find that story and put the link to the show notes as well but yeah, it’s a wonderful example, again of sort of collaboration isn’t powerful together and that sort of thing.

 

Minnie Moll 

Yeah, really, really nice. So there’s that sort of sense at a macro level. So actually, and this was a learning journey for us and our designers is that if you look at how you, your digital design, yes, it may be in smaller amounts, but there are very real changes you can make that reduce your carbon impact. So for example, and actually some of the things people might know about are when you send, when you have a great big footer on your email, it takes longer to load, it’s using up energy, you know, it’s actually a lot of people stripping the footers off their emails.

 

So when you get into brand design, here’s here’s just some examples of things that came out. First one is minimising the number of colours in your palette. So because the more colours you have, and particularly the more breath, the more energy it uses, the more complex combinations and this is all to do with pixels, it’s all to do with the energy and effects. So white, white is the most emission, emitting colour, you’d think it kind of wouldn’t be because you think it’s almost pigment less, it isn’t it’s made up of lots of pigments. So actually white, and it’s wild, some people are increasingly using dark screens on so on. So limit the number of colours in your palette, which we did. Type faces, you’re interested in typefaces that limit the number of typefaces you use, because when you’re actually again, it’s to do with loading time, which is using more energy. So if you actually have got a face that’s busy with several typefaces, it will use more energy than if you have one typeface. Photos, and we’ve acted on this actually every photo, so it’s this, every photo makes a difference and the size of that photo. So we even as a result actually went through and did some cropping.

 

Katie Treggiden 

It’s interesting, isn’t it, because there’s, I’ve been sort of I started my blog Confessions of a design geek, which was my entry into this world 13 years ago now. And you sort of started off with quite little images. And then over time, they got bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger until full screen image at you know, full width images was the trend. And you’re sort of constantly having to go back and reupload higher and higher res images and so it’s interesting to see actually, hopefully now there’ll be a reverse of that. And we’ll be moving to smaller images, again, lower res images again. And is there, so now I’m interested in the accessibility side of this, because are there places in which the sustainability guidelines support or contradict the accessibility guidelines, because I’m thinking something like a black screen with white text might be harder to read than a white screen with black text?

 

Minnie Moll 

Yeah, and also size of text. So, so Mia was basically looking at the two things side by side for us. So it was an accessibility and sustainability audit together. And yes, there are payoff points. There are payoff points. So because she was doing them together, yeah, that really helps. But yeah, there’s a payoff. And then there’s the pay off. So yes, size, you could go smaller type. But that really then starts to not be accessible. And there are certain colour combinations that really are not good for accessibility, which may or may not be the case, may or may not have any difference in terms of sustainability. So it was really good that she did the two, together. Yes, that’s really interesting. Then there’s, of course, the brand, you know, you still want to your brand to look and feel a certain way and you want to convey things with your brand to it. It’s all you know, it’s all in the balance. And I think the thing for us, it’s every little helps, you know, if every single organisation did an audit, a sustainability audit of their, their digital communication, and everyone shifted 5%.

 

Katie Treggiden 

And it’s mostly digital, is it as opposed to kind of printed matter?

 

Minnie Moll 

No, really good point. So then there’s certain things that are kind of polar opposite. So of course, white online, white digitally, is the most emitting colour. But actually, if you’ve got white when you’re going to print on white paper, that’s actually saving ink.

 

Katie Treggiden 

I know this from when I do courses and they give you workouts that are on a black background and you’re just like, Oh my God, you’re going to kill my printer.

 

Minnie Moll 

Yeah, precisely. So there are certain things where then in our guidelines, you know, if we were going to be producing something that we were going to print and like everyone, we’re not printing that much anymore, but yeah, go wild with your white. Go wild.

 

Katie Treggiden 

Yeah, that’s really interesting. And I think you know the days of when I was first in branding, it was all about consistency, consistency, consistency, whereas I think as branding has developed, it’s now much more about flexibility and kind of how things work best in different spaces. So that’s interesting.

 

Minnie Moll 

Yeah, it is was another interesting one on print, which was new to me. And I’m really old, I mean, I, when I was in advertising, we used to like, sign off all the Cromalins, and all the CMYK, and all of that stuff. And, actually, for printed material paper, block colour is really bad, recycling doesn’t like block colour. So I in terms of block colour, you know, just use a tint, or even indeed use a pattern because actually recycling is much happier with a pattern than block colour.

 

Katie Treggiden 

Interesting. I’m feeling like I need a sustainability and accessibility audit for my brand. That’s fascinating. Thank you. It’s a slight sort of nerdy side, sort of dig deep, but I suspect my audience will appreciate it. So thank you for that. So final question, before we dive into the quickfire round. We’re three years into what’s been called the decisive decade for climate change, the decade within which we have to make significant changes to avoid triggering a series of tipping points from which not only is there no return, but this sort of exponential impact. What is the role for design specifically in this decade in the next seven years and are you hopeful that we can pull it off?

 

Minnie Moll 

Yes, because I’m hopeful and positive. So the first thing to say is, I do think we have to pick up speed. I’m hopeful and positive but we, we have to pick up speed, we have to get more sense of urgency, I think is one of the key things. Then my next point, which we’ve touched on already is collaboration and partnership. This is absolutely a time, you know, if you’ve got any new insight, or any new thing that you’re using a new tool, a new case, study, share it. So powerful together. Really, really feel it’s about powerful together. And actually, and I have got here, if I can find it, there is a quote, and this was from someone at our Oh, here. Yeah. This was someone at our Design for Planet Festival last year, he said this, and it was one of the most kind of profound things that I heard at the whole festival. And I just loved it, because I think it’s really about getting designers to really rethink their role. And he said this, designers must care more about people and what already exists than about our own creative expression.

And I think that that for me is linked to my belief that we have to really redefine what innovation means. Because we have been innovation has for decades now meant new, new, faster. Innovation shouldn’t mean new innovation should mean better. And there’s a real difference with that, you know, there’s a real difference between those two words and so this sense that a designer to stop and think I’d love to do this, I’m excited by it but does the world need it? Is there already something that’s doing this really well?

 

Katie Treggiden 

I’ve just written a book about mending and repair and sort of playing with this idea that actually perhaps the designers role, and I’ve actually, I tend to talk about designers and makers. And in this book, I’ve talked about Menders and Remakers and this idea that we need to be focusing our efforts on how we repair not only objects, but also systems and natural systems and the structural issues and kind of yeah, all of those sorts of things. So I love that quote, thank you. I’m ready for the quickfire round.

 

Minnie Moll 

Before I do. Can I give you one other quote, of course, and this was something that someone else said about repairability and about waste, and so on. And so this was in the context of Phoebe English, who’s a fantastic designer who uses off cut materials, unused materials and so on. And that people who are seeking out what other people see as waste are contemporary alchemists. It’s another nice one, isn’t it? I love this idea of alchemy and materials.

 

Katie Treggiden 

Yeah, yeah, and it’s kind of I don’t want to say easy because that massively undermines a huge amount of talent, but it is relatively easy to make something beautiful out of a beautiful raw material, right if you’re given a view perfect piece of walnut if you have some skill as a furniture maker, you can turn that into something beautiful, or as to take something that is damaged, or unwanted or broken and turn that into something beautiful, that is alchemy. And that is kind of what we need, I think. Yeah. Awesome, right quickfire round. Best book that you’ve read or listened to lately.

 

Minnie Moll 

That’s easy on Audible narrated by her, Michelle Obama’s book The Light We Carry. I loved her becoming. Yeah. But the light we carry it just unpacks different things. Love it and her narrating it. Girl crush.

 

Katie Treggiden 

Totally same. I got it for Christmas. I say I got it for Christmas. I bought it for myself handed it to my husband and said this is one of my Christmas presents. And yeah, so inspiring. Favourite podcast.

 

Minnie Moll 

It’s old now. But Dolly Parton’s America. Oh, I haven’t listened to that. Ah, it was just fabulous. It was just fabulous. And there were other people kind of narrating but with pockets of her. I loved it. Nice. I think she’s an extraordinary woman.

 

Katie Treggiden 

She really is. I think the more the more time goes on, the more we’re coming to appreciate Dolly Parton. Yeah. Finish this sentence circularity is

 

Minnie Moll 

It’s actually a simple principle and we’ve lived it before and we can do it again.

 

Katie Treggiden 

Yeah, yeah, so true. That’s so true. Um, one thing you wish sustainable designers, makers and crafts people knew.

 

Minnie Moll 

There they are absolutely heroes, they’re heroes they really are. And, and they’re making a difference. I think it feels like it’s really just groundswell. I mean, I know it’s been going for ages. But you know, in country markets, or wherever it is the sense the heroes keep on doing it. And when you feel dispirited remember the Dalai Lama’s quote, If you think you’re too small, to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito.

 

Katie Treggiden 

It’s so true, isn’t it? I think so many of the designers and makers I speak to feel so guilty about the fact that they’re making stuff. And I have to kind of point them to some of the online retail giants suggests that perhaps the stuff they’re making is exactly what we need. best or worst life or business advice you’ve ever been given?

 

Minnie Moll 

So I nearly said this. I nearly said this earlier right when we were first talking. And it’s Henry Ford, who gave good quote, whether you think you’re you can or think you can’t, you’re right. Yeah, absolutely. And I remember the guy who first said that to me, he was my boss when I was quite young.

 

Katie Treggiden 

I think it’s so true, isn’t it? Because often, when you’re talking about kind of big, bold, ambitious, beautiful plans, people sort of call you deluded. Whereas actually, you know, we’re filled with voices telling us we can’t and that’s just a different delusion, pick your delusion, right?

 

Minnie Moll 

Pick your delusion and go for the positive delusion, go for the positive. And I saw the fabulous Apple film, the crazy ones that was years ago now. And it was that wonderful speech and it was Einstein and all the crazy people and they’re the ones they’re the visionaries. I saw it for some reason the other day. Yeah, we have to have that kind of dream big thinking. Right now. We have to.

 

Katie Treggiden 

Yeah, we really do. Amazing. Well, I have to say Minnie, my second meeting of you has been just as inspiring as the first. Thank you so much for taking the time to talk to me. And to be on the podcast. And yeah, keep doing what you do.

 

Minnie Moll 

Oh, a pleasure. Really good to have a chat with you.

 

OUTRO

Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Making Design Circular with Katie Treggiden. It is so lovely to know that there are people out there tuning into these conversations. If you found that interesting, I would love to connect with you on Instagram, I am on @katietreggiden.1. And if you’re a designer, maker, artist or crafts person who’s interested in sustainability and environmentalism, then please also follow @making_design_circular_ and both of those are in the shownotes. You can also follow my email newsletter there. I would be super grateful if you’re listening to this on an iPhone or iPad or other Apple device if you could leave us a review on Apple podcasts. I think that’s the only podcast platform that takes reviews, but it’s incredibly helpful to help people find us and make sure that more and more people are finding this message. So if you could take a couple of moments just to leave a review there that would be amazing. And I would also like to say a quick thank you to the incredible Kirsty Spain, who produces and edits this podcast and keeps me on track so that these episodes actually make it into your ears. So thank you very