Green Design or just Green with Envy?

Sustainability.

When you hear that word, normally the word following after it is green. But green what? What do those two words mean exactly? I know that green is a color in the rainbow and that it is the color of nature. Perhaps that is what sustainability means...Hmm Sustainability is the color of nature and the way that nature provides us with great healthy products...THEREFORE I as an American citizen will strive to buy only products with GREEN on the LABEL!!!! Whooo I am green and I am sustainable.

Sadly, that is not the definition of sustainability, Many people though were probably shaking their heads at my skewed definition of green sustainability up above. You might have heard this debate going on at your local grocery store:

Wife: Honey, will you grab the kitchen cleaner?

Husband: (after staring at long aisle of cleaning products) Uhhh, okay! (grabs first bottle of bleach, Clorox, Mr. Clean etc...shoves it in the cart and walks away)

Wife: (glances in cart and gasps reaching in gingerly to take out forbidden non green product)

WHATTT! Why did you get Clorox? I said get cleaner!!!

Hisband: But this IS cleaner like you said!!!

Wife: It's not the green kind....

Husband: They didn't have a green kind...

Wife: YES they do...everyone has a green kind

Husband: But clorox is WHITE, not GREEN?!

Wife: (sighs) LOOK! Clorox came out with green works..its safe and clean AND the liquid is green...See we are going green!!! AND now we are going to get a Brita water filter because we are no longer getting plastic water bottles...We are going GREEN GREEN GREEN!!!!

That is an example of a skewed perspective on what green and sustainability really is and why it is so important to understand the principle behind this terminology.

The definition of Sustainability is as follows:

"Meeting the needs of today, without sacrificing the ability of future generations to meet their own needs."

This defnition was created in 1987 by the World Commision on Environment and Development. This means that almost 25 years ago, people were thinking about how our environment was going to be affected today without even knowing the future. It is not a surprise that thinking about going green hasn't been around for awhile. Even before that in school we were used to hearing the three "R" s : REDUCE, REUSE, and RECYCLE! Those are key components to becoming more environmentally friendly and also thinking about how that effects your future generations.

Some people however do not truly understand when they say 'going Green". As I mentioned before, there are a lot of companies that will take the term Green, and turn it into something that is not even relevant to the actual term. This is otherwise known as greenwashing. Pretty much washing your brain with the word GREEN and that hypnotical illusion forces you to think that if it says green, it really is...

And people believe this? Yes, unfortunately they do. Think about how many people you know say that they "try" to be more green but it is just easier to repurchase something than to use it again. A prime example of this are plastic water bottles. It is just so easy to drive your hybrid car over to Wal-Mart, grab a few cases of water, and be on your merry way right? But think about all the costs that are involved in this process.

For one, some companies are saying that they produce 30% less plastic in their water bottles. GREAT EXCELLENT! Let's buy this brand. But do you really believe that their water is that much safer and that much cleaner? Everyone knows the brand Coca-Cola. They are the producers of the water Dasani. Oh Dasani! Sounds elegant and sophisticated right? Well did you know that they are just filling their tap water in PLASTIC bottles that aren't deemed eco-friendly? Exactly a clever way to fool the American people into thinking its going GREEN when in fact it isn't. http://www.thegoodhuman.com/2010/05/05/greenwash-of-the-week-sustainable-brands-2010/

There is however one corporation that is making sure that people know the good benefits of understanding Sustainability and that is the United States Grreen Building Council http://www.usgbc.org/Default.aspx

They have tried to incorporate LEED into understanding going green and sustainability. Their definition of LEED can be found here: http://www.usgbc.org/DisplayPage.aspx?CMSPageID=1988

They are commited to educating people about the positivity of promoting sustainable products, sutainable buildings and maintaining these buildings in the most environmentally friendly ways.

But it is not only up to major corporations to be sustainable and green. We have to practice these standards as well. Just because a few major companies are doing it does not leave us home free and exempt from assisting the environment. We should do our part, by starting in our own homes and researching these companies to find the real sustainable products and not become greenwashed by "labels" and celebrities endorsing these brands.

I don't know about you but I prefer to have my future generations have their needs met already before they are even born and also have them living in a much more sustainable world because of the efforts that I put in to make sure they are set for their future ad the future of generations after them.

My journey was not my own....

Many people are familiar with the faces that they see every day whether at school, in the bank, or just driving; but no one really knows their true stories. You know the reason why they are here. What brought them to this point in their lives. It is funny to see and hear their journeys and see that they were brought here through multiple tunnels all leading to the same exit path. (okay, really not trying to be too philosophical haha) But here is my journey..the path to Ai!

Growing up, I was always surrounded by family. The eldest of five children, an ever expanding family that always showed feelings and emotions and never hid anything. I always knew that after high school was college, then a degree, then working, marriage, children, family etc. That was the process. Doesn't change. But for me, it was a bit different. I was born and raised in Boston. Lived there for 13 years and was taught the Northern way of living from an early age. My parents are not American. They both grew up in Jamaica relocating to the states in their early teenage years. For them, America was the dream. You wanted to come to the states and have a better education. They were taught properly and were well educated as well as articulate in speech,

When I was born, my parents instilled values in my life that I will never forget to these days. Those were the values that I plan to instill in my children's lives one day. So as a young child, I was always taught to think differently. Many people don't believe it, or wouldn't expect it, but I was homeschooled for a majority of my life. The reason for this was because after seeing how the public school system operated, my parents decided that Home School was the best way to educate their children. So my entire life, I relied on being an independent child. I was able to completely shut out the rest of the world and concentrate on homework. Getting things done was easy for me. I was not distracted or swayed by anything because I didn't really have that growing up. You can say I was sheltered, but not from society. Social involvement, contrary to what many people believe was very important to my family. Both of my parents were heavily involved in the sports world. My father was a track and field star, a baseball/softball star, and pretty much Mister Popular. My mother was in the arts and also a basketball star. So yeah, it was pretty much expected of me that I was to either be in the arts or sports of some kind.

I chose the sports track! No questions asked. I did tennis, track & field, volleyball, soccer, softball and dabbled in basketball. I had regular lessons, private lessons, group lessons. I went on field trips and summer camps. Training camps and the gym was my life! This was just one section of my very busy life. I was also heavily involved in the arts. I took art lessons, music theory, choir and vocal lessons, painting class, dance class and a whole bunch of activites. My family never sat still. After schoolwork it was all about staing fit and healthy and not being bored on the couch. So you could say that my life was never boring, but exhausting!

My mother used to always say that I never sat still unless I was doing work. I'll never forget when I first started designing. Since I was the oldest child, I always saw the addition of another child. With the addition of another child, came the boxes of Pampers. Here is where I got creative. Me and my brother would take the boxes and saw them in half and create houses. We would X-acto out windows and use packing tape for "windows". We would use bendy straws to make "plumbing" from the sinks to the bathtubs to the gutters. Floorplans were drawn out with crayons on the bottom of the box and furniture was constructed with cardboard and Elmers Glue. Little did I know that this was a part of my future in Interior Design. I never imagined any profession along those lines. I figured I would go to my dad's Alma Mater (Northeastern University) and study business or nursing or something similar. Everyone told me that I should go to Harvard (pronounced Haaa-Vaad in Boston's twang), and become a lawyer since I talked soo much. (Do I??? Don't answer that..it was a rhetorical question!)

Of course, THAT didn't happen because in 2004, my life was changed and I moved to South Florida with the family to enjoy the warmer weather. So of course, me being 13 at the time, I was a freshman in high school. I didn't know the school systems down here so my parents agreed to homeschool me for one more year and if I really wanted to, I could "try" public school. (Of course I wanted to try public school!) So I went to public school. uh...yeah I wanted to go back to homeschool soo bad but I also wanted to be with all the kids and change classes, have a locker (yeah not the cubby hole my dad bought for us) , and eat school lunch! Hey a girl can dream! But it wasn't what I thought it was. High school FYI is not like the movies. I was slightly dissappointed. So I decided to pursue my other passion and turn to sports. I played softball, soccer and ran track. I stayed after school to become more elite and make my dream more of a reality. Truth is, I didn't really enjoy it. I only did it because I wasnted to be like my father. All American athlete. He was the track star, so I became the track star. He was a starting pitcher, so I had to be a pitcher in softball. It wasn't my dream. But I didn't really know what was my dream!

I recall, my aunt had attended the Design Academy here in Tampa and had gone to school for interior design to I figured, hey why not? I rearranged my room around pretty much once a month, had new visons for the living room and was excellent at picking paint colors and furniture for the house. But I had no idea where I was to go for a school like that? My dream was to go to Florida State University because I originally wanted to play softball there, but because sports were no longer my passion, I saw that they had Interior Design as a major so I figured hey why not?! I sent for information about the school and I was all about attending the college, til I realized, Florida was the size of Texas and Tallhassee was FAAARRRR from South Florida. I did not want to be that far from family. So here I was back at square one. No clue where I was going or even if Interior Design was to be my final career choice. Oh yeah, and SENIOR year was approaching fast!!!!!

So my Senior Year, I was signing up for classes. There was a class called Commercial Art that focused the first half on Fashion Design and the second half on Interior Design. Couldn't hurt, so yep I took the class. Funny story, my teacher had attended the Art Institute of Chicago and gradauted with a BFA in Interior Design. Ahhaaa! I found my answers! I bugged her everyday to let me skip Fashion and go straight into Interior Design. She agreed and gave me mini projects to work on. Mostly research and floorplan reading as well as perspective drawings. But I realized that I liked it! In fact I loved it! At that moment, I figured I wanted to be an Interior Designer! So then she gave me information about schools that offered interior design including Art Institutes. I took the information and put it along with the rest of the information I had gathered.

At home, my parents wanted me to take on a side project since I had "taken classes in Interior Design". (PS i only took one class my senior year..that didn't qualify me to be taking on any project but I agreed!) They wanted to extend the back of the house to incorporate all members of my family. 2 parents, 5 children, 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms doesnt quite make for a fully functional house. So I took some grid paper, a ball point pen, I grabbed the existing plan and started sketching. Eh it was okay. Nothing fancy, after all, ballpoint pen, blue ink reallllyyy doesn't mix so yeah. My mom took it to the contractor and the contractor LOVES MY BLUE PEN GRID PAPER DRAWING! Really!?!? Yepp! He said for some one who had not attended higher education, I had a knack for design. (well thanks :] ) So that was conformation that I was ya know, maybe supposed to be headed in that direction? Yeahhh!

So after my head had gotten HUGE from all the compliments that this guy was throwing my way and after all the cheek hurting smiles I sat at the computer and applied to Miami International University of Art and Design. I wanted to make my college experience fun and why not go to Miami?!?! Well after a few months we drove to check out the college. ROAD TRIP! Yeah, road trip cut short! Beautiful building, great facility but stuck in a run down part of town. My dad asked the rep what happened if I didn't have a car and had to go to school? The man answered oh walk! As if it was as easy as smiling! Whoo that smile quickly dropped from my parents face. The Caribbean in him came out! He said oh No, I don't have the money for a bulletproof vest && Mace! hahahahaha great moment dad! Thanks! But he was being protective and I was really thankful for that! The ADA for MIUAD recommended that we were closer to the Art Institute of Tampa. So we smiled, thanked the man and left.

A month went by, it was April, I had just turned 17 and STILL had no idea where I was going to school. So we drove to Tampa and checked out the school. I received a mini tour and instantly liked it. It seemed fun. A small college with excellent staff. I wanted to go soo bad. Plus the stadium was right there..HELLO famous people...(im kidding but really). That day, I filled out the application, wrote my essay, and was a proud new student of AiTa! I was really excited to be finally aware of my college decision. August couldn't come any faster!

First day of school, basic classes, didn't really see the need to take beginning drawing at 8 AM! Where were the colors and the fabrics? Apparently not in that classroom! It wasn't until the next quarter, Fall 2008 quarter. I had my first Interior Design class. Introduction to Interior Design with Alex Moore. Her dry humour made me laugh and I instantly loved class! But I looked around at everyone else in the class and felt out of place. I was 17. Everyone else was at least 20. they had already gone to college before me. This was not new to them. To me it was. I was the newbie; they took me under their wings. I became part of the community. I finally understood was design was. Real design, not this fake stuff on TV. Quarter after quarter past and finally a year then 2 years. I wasn't in my groove. But I finally became in my groove! I understood the importance of schooling and education. Not that I didn't appreciate it before, but there wasn't a real connection. Hey, I was young. I got my Aha moment after classes with Bill. I sat through critique after critique, and I was learning! I loved it. I got involved in ASID student chapters. Yeah, my design career had blossomed and I really wanted it to last for awhile.

Which brings me to now. I have 2 quarters after this and I will have completed my deisgn career here at the Art Institute of Tampa. I have learned soo much in this journey. My teachers have become my mentors. The classmates that attend here have become like my sisters. We are a community-truly. I couldn't ask for a better experience. I will always miss the days that I have spent 16 hours at school in classes and in the ID lab slaving over a project. I thrived with other people who had the same projects and we laughed and cried together. I cannot believe that this journey is almost over. But it's not over, its just a bridge to the next chapter of life! I am excited to see what is next. I cannot wait and I cannot thank everyone enough for being there to support whether or not you knew it!

This is my journey..I'm not traveling it alone..who wants to join??

[db]

Government Licensed Cartel Members?

For some people, Florida is a place where palm trees and warm sunny weather occurs year round. For others, it is a place where Constitutional Ammendments no longer mean anything & state legislature laws are nothing but history tossed to the wind.
Unconstitutional. This is a word that was recently used to describe Interior Designers in the State of Florida. Cartel. Yet another word used to describe the licensed Interior Designers that practice in the state of Florida. Pardon me, but that sounds like something horrible is going on in the Sunshine State. But, when closely examined no such thing occurs here.

As an Interior Design Student in the State of Florida, I have paid my money and put in countless hours of time devoted to a profession that I one day hope to practice. Interior Design to me is much more than a profession, its a passion that cannot be changed. Everyday, I am faced with new challenges to become more proficient at design so that one day I might take the NCIDQ and become a licensed designer as many other designers have before me. This one track mind to education and the future has not been swayed-until now.

The Institute for Justice has begun to tackle the United States and is slowly but deliberately attempting to dethrone a right such as passing the NCIDQ and receiving your license to practice Interior Design professionally in your state of residence. They have already tackled many states including Massachusetts and Alabama; Florida is next. Imagine hearing that everything you worked hard towards has all of a sudden been taken away from you. Your degree now means nothing. Studying hard hours was pointless and a waste of your time. This is what the Institute for Justice is trying to tell Interior Designers in the state of Florida.

According to this group, they believe that in order to practice Interior Design you should not need to be licensed and can practice without any form of education. This means that any Nancy Jo and Susie Somebody can all of a sudden wake up one morning and decide out of the blue to want to practice Interior Design. What? Hold on a quick moment. Just up and out of nowhere they can march to the courthouse and receive a certificate and are able to practice in one day what I have studied for 4 years. That makes me extremely upset. As a matter of fact, this makes me angry. How can a government choose non structure over structure? Honestly, that shows how much our strong solid foundations are being chipped away by ignorant non informed people.

Why is it that a profession where in life 90% of our time as human beings are spent indoors, we decide to just run away and let anybody who wants to be in control of our lives? Health, Safety and Wellness of each individual in the entire world is really reliant upon the lives of Interior Designers. Now the government just wants a random person off the street to be in control of our lives? Excuse me? I would not want to trust someone who is not licensed to be in control of my life. There are important codes that must be followed in order for a building or an interior space to be delegated as "occupiable". Do you think that everyone who wants to just "become an interior designer" knows these codes off the top of their heads? I really do not think so. It takes schooling and education to be able to make these less like learned material and more like common knowledge. Think about everything in life that we as humans partake in; everything is learned. No one thing is just automatically stored in your cerebellum as common knowledge. That is completely ridiculous for any government to allow this profession to go to the wayside and acknowledge every and anyone as Interior Designers.

As a matter of fact, the Interior Design profession is the same as any other profession out there. What if one day a random person decides that they want to be a doctor or a neurological brain surgeon? I am 100% sure that no one in any part of government would be quick to grant them that certification that takes years and years to accomplish. That is someones life in danger. A LIFE! Someone could die under your watch and that is guilt that many people cannot handle. Just as a doctor or lawyer requires years and years of schooling so do interior designers. Design is not decoration. It is not something that we can just sit and wish to understand. It takes lots and lots of school, studying, preparation and determination to make it in the industry. To think that my next door neighbor has the ability to wake up and become something that I am busting my butt to become is equal to a slap in the face to me! That is ridiculous and absurd! I cannot just wake up and think myself to be a lawyer (even though I have the ability to argue my position on many topics and life situations) I do not have the education to understand all parts of the law.

Furthermore, it is also insulting to take something so intense as a national test, the NCIDQ, and call it inadequate and irrelevant. Whoa! Let me call the Bar Exam "inadequate and irrelevant" and see how fast I become the most hated person in not only United States of America but the world. Disgust quickly overtakes my emotions when I realized that there are people out there that want no more than to shovel away at this firm foundation that has been laid upon us since the beginning. I firmly believe that for any kind of career path, whether small or large, none should be referred to as irrelevant. Irrelevancy is defined as "the lack of a relation of something to the matter at hand." So having a test that proves you are eligible to perform the tasks that are thrust upon you, with the lives of many in your hands is irrelevant? Irrelevant? Come on! If that is the case then, forget testing in school that EVERYONE grew up on. Never mind that you were taught information that was intended for you to learn and then become tested on to see if you retained the information necessary for you to pass from one level to another. That was a mistake. Wasted time and money. But whoa hold on that is not right. Everyone has to go through schooling to prove that they are eligible to move to the next level and graduate and attend higher levels of education to become licensed in their profession. TIME OUT! Then why is it so easy for you to defend education but you cannot defend something that is a very large part of our lives?

Without Interior Designers, homes would be a shell. Cars would be a frame. We could not see interior spaces as being places to call our own. There would be no need to have nice things becasue there would be no one to design them. People would try on their own to solve these problems and fail. Standards must be set in any industry before they can be further developed to make any one eligible to practice them. I am sick and tired of people saying that they can do things without schooling. What sets the standards then for rules in life? Because I say something should be a certain way, without giving an explanation to why things are they way they are, I am setting myself up for failure. These women in Florida who believe that they have the right to practice Interior Design without licensure have clearly not seen the amount of work that gets placed into interior design. They believe that they can just up and become something that they might see without knowing all the bells and whistles that are accommodating this profession. Okay America. Let them go ahead and practice Interior Design and see how many people sue them because "they didn't know what they were doing". Then when they are investigated to see why they are operating incorrectly, lets see how many more people get upset becasue they are (surprise surprise) NOT LICENSED.

I am terribly sorry but I have sat through too many classes chock full of valuable and priceless information to allow something as absurd as "no licensing" to anyone who wants to become an Interior Designer to become a law. If this is the case, might as well give up and become a doctor. I don't need my degree anyways. Shoot, how about I change my profession every single day and hopefully I reach something that I love and want to do for my entire life! That makes me annoyed. Just because you watch HGTV and oh might have a good eye for color does NOT make you automatically grandfathered in to a profession for the rest of your life. Gosh, some of the ideas of people these days are taken way too far. It is IMPERATIVE that we as students, and those who are licensed Interior Designers take a stand and protect those rights that we worked so hard to attain.

I believe that many people can make a difference. It is not just something that you read about and hope comes true for you. Take what you learned and make it yours. Fight for what you believe in, Interior Design is not decoration, neither does it make you automatically qualified to do what you please. I am appalled at the level of unprofessionalism that organizations such as the Institute of Justice have chosen to uphold. Awarding individuals the opportunity to practice Residential Interior Design may pass the government for now, but soon you will find that American people want their rights. Even though freedom of speech is a right granted to us, some speeches should not be spoken without the research and knowledge that comes with it.

Design aims to provide a solution to the problem. Decorating aims to cover up the problem.

Choose wisely.