Ecology is focus on the interaction of living organisms with each other and with the physical and chemical environment. In particular, the relationship between human and the natural environment. Increasing the human population rapidly, limited resources supply from the earth, ecology becomes an essential topic for the human long-term survival.
“Ecology and design” is also called Ecological design, Sustainable development, Green design, Eco-design……all is seek ways for reducing the impact to the environment and improving environmental health. “any form of design that minimizes environmentally destructive impacts by integrating itself with living processes.” from Ecological Design by Sim Van Der Ryn and Stuart Cowan. We have to change the lifestyle and need to follow these ecological principles in order to create a sustainable future. Global warming, losing biodiversity, clear-felling of forests, climate change, and desertification……all showing that Ecological design is the conflict of the design in the future. Designers not only consider “How does it work?” or “How does it look?”, they have to confront the challenge that make the design becomes nature.

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Ecological design is the main concept for all design. Architecture, Urban design, Industry, Fashion, Product, Package……etc, none of them not mention “Ecology”. “Carbon footprint” is a tool to measure the impact of the human activities on global warming. Reducing the carbon footprints, can make the earth more long-lasting. Thus, carbon footprint becomes an indication to label the green product. In my group, we chose “The Body Shop” which is the cosmetic industry as our presentation because they concern the environment and exert to reduce their carbon footprint from the using material, production, packaging, transportation, in store etc. It is valuable to explain the “Ecology and design” and how they are designed ecologically.
The logo of The Body Shop changed litter bit than before. They used a root of the tree and green colour to represent their global business is against climate change and the products are nearly natural. Also, they teamed up with architects, some of them renovate to an ecological sensitive workplace. Consider the sustainable architecture and the quality of the environment, they used renewable energy such as natural light for the day lighting and the wind for the high-quality ventilations. The working condition becomes better because of sustainable design. Moreover, most of their stores refit the LED(light-emitting diode) lighting to improve the energy efficiency and certainly the energy consumption reduced by 70%. It is definitely slow down using in energy and pollution crisis and reduces the carbon footprint. In order to show they are eco-friendly, the walls in the stores were painted in green, brown and white for those are natural colours to represent their values are eco-friendly.
For the product of The Body Shop, not only the ingredients, but also the packaging, they always strive to protect the planet and minimize the harm to the environment. Follow the principles of ecological design, the ingredients are grown using time-honoured techniques that means the nutrient in the land can restore naturally after harvest and won’t become desertification due to the over-planting. As members of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm oil (RSPO), all of their soaps are produced using palm oil sourced that is successfully audited in line with RSPO regulations. Thinking about the climate characteristics of the bioregional system, it is a positive case that can give us a healthy planet and reduce the deforestation. Many company just made a beautiful package for its product, they only consider how to attract people to buy the goods and they seldom regard the environment. However, The Body Shop advocates for reducing waste on their packaging. Neither the primary packaging nor the secondary packaging, they won’t over-package. The design of the bottle is simple, not very colourful, just a transparent bottle contain some texts and simple shape. Although it is simple, it can reduce the storage space so that it can reduce the use of fossil fuels in the transportation. They only use the necessary material for the packaging to reducing the carbon footprint and it is environmentally friendly. The plastic bottles contain the natural ingredients made form PET (polyethylene terephthalate) which is 100% recycled material. Furthermore, they also used to collect the empty bottles for recycling. Especially the Hemp Heroes gift set is presented in a carton made form highly sustainable materials which are bamboo, 100% cruelty-free bristles and recycled aluminum ferrules and printed with non-toxic inks. All of these materials are helping to communicate the planet and make eco-friendly.
In the secondary packaging, they have paper bag and organic cotton bag. For the Paper Bag, they replaced all plastic bags with 100% recycled paper and printed by using water-based inks which are not contain harmful solvents. It can reduce the waste and the pollution for the environment. For the cotton bag which made form 100% organically grown cotton, uses a simple font and natural green colour, some of the words are in bold to emphasis a point and it catches your eye immediately. Since the cotton bag is long-lasting, The Body Shop encourages customers to reuse the bag and give them an environmentally beneficial consumer choices form the paper bag.
All of it is friendly product, they consider the relationship between production and consumption and assist consumers to greening the society. That is a good behavior for develop our desirable and sustainable environment.
There are three main campaigns that The Body Shop emphasize on. Against Animal testing, protect our planet and Human rights. Animal testing is use of animals for the process in scientific experiments, this testing in the cosmetic industry had been used for thousand of years but nowadays. Although the testing is carried out for the improvement of human lives, there are serious issues and ethical issues we need to faces. The Body Shop against animal testing because they believe that animals should not be used for cosmetic testing due to the animal rights. They have never tested their products on animals, in the same way, they also require their suppliers not test the ingredients on animals for cosmetic purposes. Basically, they against animal testing just for one reason, they don’t want to be a cruel corporation and don’t willing to carry this inhuman practice on the animals. Without the use of animals on the cosmetics, The Body shop won the RSPCA Good Business Award for a second time, for their commitment to animal welfare.
Being a green retailer, they seek for the sustainable environment and prevent the climate change. “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle” are their policy. By using the renewable resources, sustainable raw ingredients can protecting the rainforests and minimize the impact to the planet. Also, finding some environmentally friendly crops can prevent erosion and improve the condition of the soil.
For campaigned against injustices, The Body Shop use Community Trade ingredients in their products that means the trading is fair and the small-scale farmers can earning a fair wage and working in fair conditions. All the mentions are uphold the human rights and regarding child labour, discrimination, employee pay, hours and working conditions.
Design is basic to all human activities but due to human Ecology and Social Change, many of us seek environmentally friendly and reducing our carbon footprints. People no longer just consider the products are user-friendly but also eco-friendly. Sustainable, renewable, reducing destructive of the environment..etc, all of them must be considering in the design process for develop our better future. The Body Shop is one of the industry focuses on this conflict and make their products become natural. Reducing the destructive of the environment, The Body Shop believe that “beauty is as much about feeling beautiful as it is about looking beautiful.”