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I am reading Cradle to Cradle by William McDonough, an architect and Michael Braungart, a chemist. I read a few pages every day, just to make it last as long as I can. Why? Because I like the book very much and it is food for my thoughts.

The subtitle is “Remaking the Way We Make Things”. The book is a manifesto that presents a new approach to manufacturing. It encourages a paradigm shift and the term “eco-effectiveness” is coined. They challenge the conventional view that we should recycle, reduce our emissions and reduce our use of natural resources. Doing less harm is good, but it is even better to do good. They mean that what we call recycling is really downcycling. Buildings, neighborhoods and even whole cities can be entwined with surrounding ecosystems in ways that are mutually enriching.

Their idea is to not try to reduce waste, but to eliminate the concept of waste altogether, while preserving commerce and allowing for human nature. Sounds like a dream doesn’t it? The authors work together along this path and have created products and buildings in a new and radical way. Even the book itself is special. It is made of fully recyclable plastic with non-toxic ink. The live in their vision.

It is easy to be pessimistic about man. We have ruined and spoiled nature. We fight each other. But man has also achieved great things, even landed on the moon. Couldn’t we use our ingenuity to live in symbiosis with nature? Couldn’t we learn from the ecosystem of the nature and build our own ecosystem to reflect that. The authors think it is possible. I almost begin to believe also…