As a part of Google’s Environment Day on April 25th, we invited architect, designer, thought leader, and author William McDonough to Google NYC for a talk on "Design as Optimism." Moderated

As a part of Google’s Environment Day on April 25th, we invited architect, designer, thought leader, and author William McDonough to Google NYC for a talk on "Design as Optimism." Moderated by Mary Davidge. Design is the first signal of human intention. We are all designers because we all have intentions. What if our intention is to do good and make the world better because we are here? William McDonough shares real world examples of materials, products, buildings, communities, and economies that were designed in the search for good. About William McDonough William McDonough points the way toward “more good, rather than less bad” values and practices for businesses in all sectors at all scales—showing how a positive future of continuous improvement is possible now. He is an architect, a global leader in sustainable development, and serves on the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on the Future of Environment and Natural Resource Security. For more than 40 years, McDonough—through McDonough Innovation, William McDonough + Partners, Architects, and MBDC—has defined the principles of the sustainability movement. He is co-author of Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things (2002) and The Upcycle: Beyond Sustainability—Designing for Abundance (2013). He also co-founded the not-for-profit Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute; and in 2012, he became the subject of Stanford University Libraries’ first “living archive.” McDonough has received the Presidential Award for Sustainable Development (1996), the first U.S. EPA Presidential Green Chemistry Challenge Award (2003), and the National Design Award (2004). In January 2017, he was awarded the Fortune Award for Circular Economy Leadership at the World Economic Forum’s Annual Meeting where he was hailed as “the father of the circular economy”. In 2009, he co-founded the Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute, to scale up the rigorous product certification program. Time magazine recognized him as a “Hero for the Planet,” noting: “His utopianism is grounded in a unified philosophy that—in demonstrable and practical ways—is changing the design of the world.”

William Winkel is a researcher with the Detroit Historical Society and the co-manager of the Detroit ’67 Oral History Project. He contributed to the book, Detroit 1967: Origins, Impacts, and

William Winkel is a researcher with the Detroit Historical Society and the co-manager of the Detroit ’67 Oral History Project. He contributed to the book, Detroit 1967: Origins, Impacts, and Legacies. He has conducted extensive fact-finding on this subject and performed dozens of interviews in this regard. Winkel is a graduate of Wayne State University. The Myth of the Model City will explore both the lead up to and the uprising in the City of Detroit in 1967. Understanding what led to the uprising is imperative to understand the unrest. Additionally, this lecture will seek to dispel the many myths that surround ‘67. Get the book here: https://goo.gl/iLMEK9

Most of us would like to live in a society accountable to people and the planet, one in which we exercise genuine agency over our lives and have a real say in the decisions that affect our

Most of us would like to live in a society accountable to people and the planet, one in which we exercise genuine agency over our lives and have a real say in the decisions that affect our communities, but the dramatic increase in corporate domination, especially the rise of giant tech companies that wield unprecedented levels of surveillance and control, is radically undermining our democracy and concentrating wealth and power in fewer and fewer hands. Stacy Mitchell, who has long been at the forefront of the national movement to rein in excessive corporate power and reinvigorate local self-reliance, is here to tell us that, as powerful as these immense companies and their political allies may seem, they’ve finally met their match. A broad grassroots alliance, together with a new generation of creative government leaders, is bringing long-dormant anti-monopoly laws and strategies back to life. This promising turn of events, Stacy will explain, offers hope for reclaiming our rights and assuring a far more equitable and greener future.

This keynote talk was delivered at the 2024 Bioneers Conference. To see other talks from the conference, visit http://www.bioneers.org