Have you tried one of those online carbon footprint calculators yet? According to this one, my family of three is adding around 51 tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere every year. But another online tool gauges my annual household emissions at 36,411 pounds (about 18 tons). Clearly, calculating carbon footprints is not yet an exact science.
That doesn’t stop our Design for the Environment (DfE) group from trying, though. They’re working to gather the information required to determine the carbon footprints of Herman Miller’s products. No easy task, given that most are made of multiple parts–the Aeron chair, for example has around 200–and you have to know the composition and manufacturing process of each (and how it’s shipped and where from) before you can factor in the energy used to assemble the chair and translate the result into carbon emissions.
In a recent interview with Metropolis magazine, DfE manager Gabe Wing, explains that the challenge is “finding a standardized way to determine carbon footprints. Right now there is no single standard.” Still, if it isn’t yet possible to measure carbon emissions exactly, Wing says, it is feasible to lower them by setting benchmarks for new product designs, choosing materials that have inherently low carbon footprints, and encouraging suppliers to use renewables in their own manufacturing processes.
The Envelop desk has received considerable attention for its versatility and unique ability to move with the user. But what’s the best application for such a cutting-edge design? That’s the question we posed to interior designers in the Envelop Design Challenge—a competition Herman Miller initiated last December. The answer? Anywhere and everywhere.
Given the versatility of the Envelop desk, it was no surprise when we received over forty entries displaying the desk in myriad ways—ranging from private offices to group work settings to classrooms. With all of the great designs, it was a challenge in itself to choose the winners.
After considerable deliberation, our team of designers selected four winners who displayed the most creativity with their use of Envelop. Our first place winner, Angela Glenn, placed Envelop in a beautiful work environment by incorporating Teneo storage furniture and Meridian filing and storage (above).
In contrast, our two second place winners, Christa Markey and Gretel Lott, stepped out of the office environment: Christa brought Envelop into a campus coffee shop…
And Gretel built the desk into an air traffic control room.
Our third place winner, Susan Weisenfeld, used one kit of parts for two different types of workstations; both centered on the Envelop desk.
Check out The Be Collection to learn more about our winners and see renderings of these unique applications.
Of course Mark Goetz designs furniture that looks good and functions well, but to him, that’s not enough. He wants people to like his pieces, too. “You could live with a good solution and not really like it. Objects should be loved and wanted as well as provide a solution,” he says.
Over the course of his career, Goetz solutions have found their way into the headquarters of the Chicago Bulls, the Kennedy Center in Washington, and the president’s office at Harvard. He’s designed an extensive collection of chairs, casegoods, and tables for Bernhardt Design and others.
A daunting challenge for Goetz was to create a sofa for the Herman Miller for the Home collection that would complement its classic Eames, Noguchi, and Nelson pieces. The result is the Goetz sofa, a clean, unfussy design with a veneer shell and padded upholstery and pillows that is substantial enough to relax in or even to nap in. Goetz also created the Aside chair for Herman Miller.
Once you pass through security, Chicago’s O’Hare International Terminal has little to offer. A few vending machines and a barren mile or so of concourses stretching in either direction. You can walk, or you can sleep. I chose to walk.
After trekking the north concourse, I headed south, where posters began to bloom on the walls. These were not your beach-and-palm-tree images. They were colorful, whimsical works of art announcing a concert in Mexico City or promoting peace or literacy in the U.S.
Apparently, in 2008, Chicago had held its first International Biennial Poster Competition (CIBP), which had attracted an amazingly large and diverse number of entries from around the world. Winners had been exhibited in the Daley Bicentennial Park in downtown Chicago.
I was looking at the afterglow—“Top Dogs: Works of the 11 Jurors of the CIPB”—and these jurors themselves comprised a star-studded roster of artists from Japan, Mexico, France, Israel, and Canada.
“Design luminary” John Massey had been the Top Dogs’ top dog—the head juror for the competition. This poster, as sophisticated and understated in black and white as the furniture it was promoting, seemed like a tip of the hat from one grand master of design to another.
You just never know what you’ll find hanging around in an airport during a long layover.
The 2010 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) concluded on January 10 after four days of new product displays, conference sessions, and celebrity appearances. Over 2,500 technology companies gathered in Las Vegas, contributing to the record number of new exhibits at this year’s show. Even amidst all of the excitement among technology products, Herman Miller’s Envelop desk created quite a buzz.
Envelop, a desk that moves with the user as he or she reclines, was featured with the Embody chair. Envelop was well received by designers and users alike, drawing considerable media attention. Since its appearance at CES, Envelop has received excited reviews from multiple media sources, including the popular blogs Gizmodo, Uncrate, and PhotoInduced, for its ergonomic benefits and ability to comfortably cater to the user.
Envelop’s clever design ultimately has the user in mind. At CES 2010, they noticed.
Recently, the Associated Press distributed an article about how “sitting too much could be deadly.” A number of regional newspapers, including my hometown Chicago Tribune picked it up. As a furniture industry veteran and seating researcher for the better part of two decades, it was too broad—and dire—a statement for my personal comfort.
In helping designers like Bill Stumpf and Jeff Weber to develop Herman Miller products—from stacking chairs, such as Caper, to high-performance work chairs, such as Embody—I’ve learned that sitting, comfort, and health are not so cut-and-dried.
In the 1990s I began using pressure map technology, which visualizes what the seat and sitter interface looks like—and how it changes depending on seat construction and the posture of the sitter. These changes translate to comfort or discomfort for the user.
More recently, in the course of our Embody chair development, I commissioned researchers at both the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago and Milwaukee’s Marquette University, who measured the amount of oxygen in the blood flowing to and from subjects’ lower extremities and heart rate–key health measures. It turns out, both improved when users sat in the Embody chair, versus other chairs, doing the same seated tasks in both.
So, it’s not a simple question of sitting down or standing up—but where and how you’re sitting.
I once worked at a company housed in the second floor of an old mill building. You might be thinking “lovely renovated office space with high ceilings and tons of character.” You’d be wrong. The building was dirt-cheap chic and the only character it had was a homeless man who slept in the unoccupied first floor.
Our office space consisted of shoddily constructed half-walls and an eclectic mix of broken down desks, wobbly chairs—and, most important of all, space heaters. In winter, there’d be miniature snowdrifts on the window sill, and you could see your breath until 10 a.m. We never had temperature wars in that office. We just cranked the thermostat as high as it would go, and our space heaters, too.
Granted, ours was an extreme case. But recent IFMA research shows that complaints about the temperature top the list of common office grievances. Facilities managers say they get an almost equal number of complaints about the office being too hot or too cold.
This is a big deal because there’s a positive correlation between comfort and productivity. Unfortunately, it’s tough to keep everybody happy and comfortable all the time. As any facility manager will tell you, often the person complaining about the office being too hot is sitting right next to the person complaining about it being too cold.
Facility managers do the best they can, but when it’s not enough, people do what they have to do. They use space heaters (frowned upon because of the fire hazard), heating pads, personal fans, supplemental clothing and, in one case reported in the research, a small wading pool under the desk in which the worker could “paddle” his feet to cool them off.
Herman Miller has a sweet and sensible alternative that uses 90% less energy than space heaters. C2 climate control uses advanced thermal electric technology to provide heating and cooling in a single unit. Someday I’d like a C2 for my home office, but for now I use a foot warmer to stay warm. What’s your solution?
Did you know that a huge problem for hospitals right now is in med dispensing rooms–nurses giving the wrong drugs to patients, often as a result of poor working conditions, such as cramped, inefficiently designed spaces?
Or that college classrooms are being looked at in entirely new ways because of how technology influences learning in high school these days?
I learned about both of those issues–and a lot of other interesting things, too–by working on Herman Miller case studies. Case studies are short summaries about a particular challenge a customer was having and how furniture and/or design solved the problem.
I find these solutions to be quite fascinating. For example, there is a company in Vermont that turns giant truck trailers into fully-equipped, high-tech mobile health care units, where doctors perform everything from surgeries to eye exams. They’re shipped all over the world to meet a variety of needs–from hospitals requiring temporary operating rooms to war zones and disaster areas.
If you’re a designer, you should check it out. It will help you keep up with what’s going on in the world – and keep learning. After all, isn’t that what libraries are for?
Tom Newhouse walks the environmental talk. From the earth-bermed, passive solar house and studio that he designed and built in 1978 to his recreational choices (kayaking, hiking, and snowshoeing—“all human-powered activities”), Tom has lived his ethos despite the shifting winds of fad and cultural consciousness. Sustainability is part of the “Four Corners Philosophy” of design from which he operates. According to Tom, products should be: aesthetically pleasing, sustainable, ergnomic, and cost-effective. Tom works primarily in the areas of home and office furniture, kitchens, and lighting. His most recent design for Herman Miller was the Flute personal light.
Here are seven questions for Tom Newhouse: Read more
I don’t envy designers their task of deciding which fabrics and finishes to choose for furniture. With so many choices and constraints to deal with, I hear it can be a complex and frustrating process. But it’s also typically the favorite part of their job because it’s a chance to get creative. So to make things easier, more gratifying, and more fun, Herman Miller revamped its Materials Program. They’ve made it simple, logical, and closely aligned with how designers and specifiers like to think about and use materials.
In addition to the online Materials Program, Herman Miller developed a new way for designers to interact with the choices the company offers. The Materials Collection, a sensibly-sized, permanently bound, recyclable set of books, contains complete swatch presentations for the entire textile and finish offering. The Collection is housed in four Baltic birch plywood slipcases. Nice. Reliable. Easy to use. So easy even a writer could do it. Read more
Have you tried one of those online carbon footprint calculators yet? According to this one, my family of three is adding around 51 tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere every year. But another online tool gauges my annual household emissions at 36,411 pounds (about 18 tons). Clearly, calculating carbon footprints is not yet an exact science.
Of course 
Once you pass through security, Chicago’s 
I once worked at a company housed in the second floor of an old mill building. You might be thinking “lovely renovated office space with high ceilings and tons of character.” You’d be wrong. The building was dirt-cheap chic and the only character it had was a homeless man who slept in the unoccupied first floor.
