GREEN DESIGN FESTIVAL 2010 PRESS RELEASE

1ΒΛΕΠΩ ΠΡΑΣΙΝΟI SEEGREEN23 SEPTEMBER10 OCTOBER

INTRO / ORGANISER / GREEN DESIGN FESTIVAL 2010 (3-4) PROGRAMME (5) ΕCOMUSEUM (6-7) ΕCOMUSEUM EXHIBITIONS - ARCHITECTURE (8-14) ΕCOMUSEUM EXHIBITIONS - INDUSTRIAL DESIGN (15)

ΕCOMUSEUM EXHIBITIONS - OPEN GREEN LIBRARY (25)

ΕCOMUSEUM EXHIBITIONS - GREEN SCREENINGS (27)

ΕCOMUSEUM EXHIBITIONS - FASHION DESIGN (16-18)

ΕCOMUSEUM EXHIBITIONS - MEDITERRANEAN GARDEN (26)

GREEN DESIGN FESTIVAL IN THE CITY (28) EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMS(29)

ΕCOMUSEUM EXHIBITIONS - GRAPHIC DESIGN (19-24)

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GREEN DESIGN FESTIVAL 2010September 23 to October 10, Athens, Greece

INTRO_

Green Design Festival is an original, open-air, open-to-all event is supported by the City of Athens and the Hellenic Ministry of the Environment, Energy and Climate Change. With the Grand Sponsorship of the Hellenic Postbank, over 150 designers from all design-related fields are taking part, along with architects, curators and volunteers. Green Design Festival seeks to present design in all forms and applications to spark a discussion on a contemporary way of life that is friendlier towards the environment, and to help construct more positive environmental attitudes through its suggestions and the themes it addresses.

Syntagma Square is the hub of this year’s Green Design Festival.The activity centres on the unique Ecomuseum, an environmentally-friendly, recyclable structure that will be hosting exhibitions, events and educational programmes. Architectural installations are also on display at another seven points around central Athens, inviting the public to view Athens from a different angle.

For the duration of the Green Design Festival, new technologies, image and design are employed to transform the city into a living interactive space filled with ideas and suggestions. The festival is examining the repercussions of climate change through the prism provided by the different fields of design, and through an emphasis on models of sustainability (on both an environmental and social level). It is also employing renewable and alternative energy sources, exploring the relationship between ecological awareness and the economy, and striving to ‘redesign’ our everyday lives in a more environmentally-friendly way.

ORGANISER_

Green Design Festival is organized by Brainlab, an independent, not-for-profit NGO. Brainlab was founded in 2007 by architects, curators and freelance professionals aiming at creating cultural activities relating to social and environmental issues, which would encourage innovation in the applied arts in Greece. The members of Brainlab offer their services on a voluntary basis.More on Brainlab, http://www.brainlab.gr

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PROGRAMMEECOMUSEUM

The Ecomuseum in Syntagma Square forms the hub of both the festival programme and all its parallel activities. All the exhibitions in which design is presented withina ‘green’ culture and a ‘green’ mindframe are housed in the Ecomuseum.Design-wise, the Ecomuseum itself is a temporary green architectural structure containing exhibition spaces, a small verdant amphitheatre and a solar panel stage powered entirely by the sun.

The Ecomuseum also serves as an exhibition item in its own right, constituting a new proposal for public spaces in the city. Like a ‘green skin’, the Ecomuseum embraces the intimacy of nature, the security of an unobstructed skyline and the relaxation of a park to downtown Athens. As such, its form and aesthetics broadcast the message that the positive power of nature can figure in the urban landscape and even reclaim territory we have paved over.

Design:Constantinos HoursoglouConstruction: A&M Architects

The central message conveyed by the Ecomuseum’s design is that greenery can return to the city and coexist with the needs of the community. In short, that the harshly austere cityscape can be transformed into a neighbour-hood garden.

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ECOMUSEUM HIGHLIGHTS

GREEN ROOF

The main entrance to the Ecomuseum is a real sustainable green roof in theurban context.

Green roofs are becoming more widespread as a green tool in bioclimatic architecture, since green roofs appeal to an essential need: the need for a healthier and friendlier environment. Green roofs have a number of environmental, economic and social benefits: They create natural habitats for animals and plants, as well as living spaces for people, and also minimize the “heat island” effect. Large-scale urban green roof development can also significantly reduce the ambient temperature in their vicinity, as well as helping reduce carbon emissions by reducing the energy consumed for heating and cooling. The Ecomuseum’s roof is an extensive green roof planted with Mediterranean plants that require minimal irrigation and maintenance. It is a lightweight multilayered system build on a 12cm substrate especially designed for Mediterranean climatic conditions. The plants on the green roof are planted in digitally-generated molecular forms that echo the multicultural structure of the urban hive._

SOLAR PANEL STAGE

In an attempt to spotlight the relationship between design and the energy consumption advantages offered by photovoltaic panels, the Ecomuseum’s central stage is powered by solar energy. This prototype solar panel stage will be used to screen the daily ‘Green Screenings’ programme, the educational programmes for schools, and all the Festival’s parallel events._

GREEN AMPHITHEATRE

An 100-seat green amphitheatre aims at becoming a meeting point for Athens residents and visitors alike during the festival, as well as a forum for the fruitfulexchange of ideas on protecting the environment._

GREEN SIGNS

In cooperation with Athens Voice and Prasino Pontiki— two of Green Design Festival’s media sponsors—used newspapers are recycled and converted into pulp. Greek and Latin letters were designed and created by pulp and are part of the signaging of the Ecomuseum, as well as a proposal for sustainable & creative communication. _

Landscape Design: elandscapelandscape architecture_design, planning, management, conservation, sustainability

Design: Eleni Aspiotou

Design:busybuildingImplementation:busybuilding in cooperation with volunteers, Athens Voice and the Prasino Pontiki

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GREEN LIGHTING

The Ecomuseum’s lighting has been designed and implemented in cooperation with diathlasis, the architectural lighting firm which will be showcasing a sustainable lighting system for contemporary cities. Its groundbreaking new LED-based public lighting system will certainly stimulate the discussion on street lighting and light pollution. This innovative system keeps energy costs down significantly by cutting the energy consumed by up to 65%, thereby reducing the impact on the environment by reducing emissions of carbon dioxide, the gas mainly responsible for the greenhouse effect.

Design & implementation:diathlasis

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ΕΧΗΙΒΙΤΙΟΝS / ECOMUSEUMARCHITECTURE & CLIMATE CHANGE

Both established and up-and-coming architects and architectural practices have created open-air installations on the theme of climate change and its consequences. The installations seek to inform, educate and raise public awareness, but also to coexist and interact with the public along a unique architectural route in Syntagma Square and in the city._

Participants:

aka/ Αntigoni ΚapsaliGagani:“SOURCE OF ENERGY”

For years “it grew where it wasn’t seeded”, until it’s persistence occupied some; from “fearful invader” it became known as “source of energy”.

The Vlahs (Armani) call it gagani, the scientists cardoon and greek people donkey-thorn (thistle). A weed that sprung up in Syntagma Square. Noone had invited it but it has learned to persevere. It wants to introduce itself as, Greek, inexpensive and environmental friendly, OIL.It produces biomass with carbon neutral emissions, whose combustion has a low sulphur (S) content, while all the elements except nitrogen (N), return to the ground as ashes.

An integrated circle of “green” energy production that relieves the greenhouse effect and acid rain. In Greece, where the electricity sector is the No.1 environmental enemy since it is responsible for 53% of all national CO2 emissions, “gagani” offers a solution.

Don’t be misled by the fact that it is yellow and dry, it’s the “greenest” of them all and it’s here to stay. It lives in the “earth vase”… it’s warm and bright… _

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dARCHstudio-Elina Drossou ArchitectsTemperature increase“The Cool umbrella “

The creation of a microclimate, which is both comfortable and tailored to the needs of outdoor spaces, helps significantly in counteracting the problem of the eminent climate change of the world. The cooling umbrella responds to the naturalness of the space of a microclimate, as it constructed out of three basic “ingredients” of nature: air, earth and water. The trunk of the umbrella functions as a wind catcher as it “ties” up the air and by the help of water cools the space. The hanging plants, representing the earth element, which spread towards the East and the West, surround the structure thereby maintaining the cooler temperatures. The visitor is asked to participate in the operation/working of the umbrella. By altering the position of the plants towards the sun, s/he becomes part of the composition of the “green” evolving walls creating each time the best conditions of shade and cool. The umbrella can be “planted” anywhere … on squares, beaches, bus stops … anywhere where someone might need a place to cool off! _


Drifting City - Petros Babasikas,Chrissou Voulgari, Farzad MoréDRIP

Drip is a public space installation juxtaposing the organic and the inorganic as upward and downward flows in time, triggered by atmosphere and gravity in a 2.5x2.5m vertical garden.

Drip consists in a large volume of salt held 3m above a planter. 9 cables stretch in between. A cloud of artificial fog is deployed on the salt. Salt and water drip over the planter through special orifices: they crystallize downward, in time, forming 9 stalactites over the planter. Creeper plants grow upward from the planter. Watered by the fog, they strive to break through the salt. Stalactites and plants bond together in time. The vertical garden becomes compact and inaccessible, rapidly impacted by rain.

Drip keeps transforming under the refracted light of the suspended salt-volume. It works like an urban hourglass, changing in time, physically and locally responding to a global phenomenon, aiming to redefine climate change as a hybrid, transitory stage also known as “Salt of the Earth.”_


k&k architects (Katerina Kotzia & Korina Filoxenidou)

Aris M. KlonizakisSpiros I. PapadimitriouΑΝΟΚΑΤΟ

One of the major impacts of climate change is that Earth’s ice cover is rapidly melting. That effect has already changed Earth’s geography, and also threatens the human geography. “ANOKATO” is an interactive exhibit that uses the concept of the ‘see-saw’ motion and balance. The visitor by interacting with the installation realizes the extent of his/her participation in the maintenance or subversion of earth’s climate equilibrium.

“ANOKATO” promotes the development of collectiveness and also the idea that through participation and collaboration, we can overturn the established adverse situations and turn things ‘upside down’ to bring new and desirable viable balances._


Monored - Konstantinos Chrysos, Marianthi TatariHELIOMETER

Global warming is our most tangible proof that our planet is experiencing climate change. Monored have experimented with an empirical simulation of future warming in Athens. While the installation seems to protect the visitor from the Attic sun, the properties and colour of the selected material actually increase the sun’s intensity, giving the visitor an experience of the future atmosphere in that location. Heliometer is a sustainable and reusable eco-installation: its materials are durable, recyclable and employed with maximum efficiency through the application of CAD/CAM technologies. The form and brightness of the installation serve to blur the visitors’ perception and to challenge the impression of a protective shelter: is it an umbrella, a temperature graph, a snapshot of a natural disaster, or a cumulonimbus cloud at sunset? _


Paan architectsAsh Gazebo

A piece of burnt forest is detached from its context and is placed in the city in form of a gazebo. The construction constitutes an alien urban object that contributes to the awareness of the importance of the phenomenon.

In the history of landscape architecture the gazebo offered a privileged position for the enjoyment of the tamed landscape, expressing the will for absolute structural control of nature. In this mentality of utilization and appropriation of nature we detect the initial cause of climate change.

In Greece nature has been often sacrificed in the name of personal interests and that of the built environment. A characteristic example is forest fires, a problem that consists of the main aspects of climate change in our country.

Everybody has a personal experience that relates directly to the phenomenon and that is one of the reasons why we chose this as the theme for our installation. A piece of burnt forest is detached from its context and is placed in the city in the form of a gazebo. The construction constitutes an alien urban object that contributes to the awareness of the importance of the phenomenon._


WORKINPROGRESSThe “inhospitable” and the “intimate”

A building is a living organism. The way it affects its surroundings, and the materials used for its construction, define its ecological ‘behavior’.The building, as a shell, has to satisfy a human’s needs for protection and also for communication with the natural environment. However, the building ‘lives’ in the same environment with humans and it has the same needs with them. The need to “breathe and change its skin” according to the climatic conditions.The visitor is invited to feel the contrast between a closed inhospitable space referring to the built environment of the cities and a space, which hosts a part of nature by opening its roof. The elements of water and plants contribute to the control of temperature and create a sense of intimacy. The natural environment is not a complement or a decorative to the urban landscape but a necessity for the maintenance of balance. _

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INDUSTRIAL DESIGNSUSTAINABLE DESIGN

Industrial designers concern themselves with the relationship between people, materials and objects. Their work is founded on the link between people, usability, materials and production, but also aesthetics and sustainability, an increasingly vital notion in the present era.

The primary aim of the industrial design exhibition to be held as part of the Green Design Festival is to present the principles of sustainable development in a tangible way in the form of real objects which were especially designed for it. These principles define the materials and techniques used, but also determine the overall approach to the object’s life-cycle and hence—by extension—bring with them a new perception of consumer goods. Industrial designers from Greece and abroad will be presenting everyday utility objects—small items of furniture and toys—in a way which focuses on their choice of material and its unique properties, whose environmentally-positive attributes are explained to visitors.

Simple and modern, useful and functional, the presence of these objects conveys the message that living in harmony with our surroundings does not necessarily entail radically changing our way of life.

Curator:Christopher BrellisCoordination and design:antidot design studio

Participants:Lime StudioAlexis Georgacopoulos Sergios Fotiadis / We|designAlexandros Didaskalou / edg designlabFoant Asour, Aliki Rovithi / DEDE DextrousDesignZaxos Stathopoulos / zound systems studioDimitrios Diafas Constantinos Economides, Brian Ward / wedid-idEvangelos Kaimakis & Valentini Kaimaki

Sergios Fotiadis / We|design Alexandros Didaskalou / edg designlab

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FASHION DESIGNDIY FASHION TALES

The idea behind Green Design Festival’s FASHION project for 2010 is DIY (Do-It-Yourself) fashion with an emphasis on the environment and ecological awareness.

40 DIY “items“: New, original and creative ideas for alterations and ‘transformations’ within the grasp of every social group. Proposals to all for recycling and reusing our old clothes and accessories.

We just need to think simply…The production of one kilo of clothing, demands the consumption of 60 kilos of water from the water stock of our planet.Does it worth it?The decision is on us.

This idea took a step further towards social sensitivity and humanism. We though that some of our “items” could be especially created in order to be offered to children in vulnerable social groups…We met these children. Scenes from their everyday lives, beloved objects, drawings and whatever else they wanted to share with us, became an image, became photographs.

The result: one child, one designer, one inspiration, one gift!

ΣΥΝΤΕΛΕΣΤΕΣ: CONTRIBUTORS:Curator:Nikandre Koukoulioti Production:Marilena StafylidouCo-ordination:Evi XanthakiVideo direction:George KouvarasPost-Production:UNDO (www.undo.gr)Photography:Marilena Stafylidou (www.marilenastafylidou.com)Research:Dimosthenis GaveasWHITE BOX team leader:Maria Louka (blogbywhitebox.blogspot.com)WHITE BOX texts:Smaro Botsa WHITE BOX DESIGNERS: Jessica Josafat (www.jewelsbyjessica.com),Olga Mergou, Foteini Kostouli, Stella Galanti, Katerina Vamvaka-Kostantinos Patzias, Kika Karabela-Aggelos Euthymiou,Marika Poulopoulou, Fani Vogiatzi(www.maslinda.gr), Maria Κoutmani, Nikos Glavinas, Thania Iordanidou, Angela Rapti, Neratzoula Delinikola.

Head of Swap Not Shop / Chic & Ethic lab:Sandra Odette Kypriotaki The following artists and designers will also be participating in DIY FASHION TALES: fashion designer:Sotiris Georgiou (www.sotirisgeorgiou.gr)special constructions:Dimitra Papadimitropouloudirector:Giorgos Nanouris

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Clothing and accessories were specially created, by creative team WHITE BOX, for each child using pre-owned materials—clothing, accessories, toys and anything else someone was considering throwing away. The children’s photographs were sewn onto each article of clothing, inside or out. These children will be invited to find their images and own their items.

Somewhere among the children’s drawings, Aslan (aged 19) has written: “I would like Athens to be happier”.

And that is our aim: a dose of happiness for children who need it. Someone has though about them, cared and designed for them.

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GRAPHIC DESIGNEco Heroes

What does protecting the environment really mean? How can we define ‘environmentally-responsible behaviour’? What can each of us do for the environment? There are real «eco heroes» all around us whose attitudes, initiatives and ideas are truly worthy of imitation. In cooperation with Prasino Pontiki, Green Design Festival is presenting ten of our fellow citizens whose stories could help each of us, our communities and the society in which we live, to adopt greener attitudes.

The EcoΗeroes exhibition called upon 10 young Greek graphic designers to spotlight through their posters the stories of our citizen models who continue to put environmental protection into action in their everyday lives.

At the same time, the exhibition are examining graphic design as an instrument for social change, rather than an adjunct to marketing and consumption. Visual communication in the service of social design can convey ideas, influence attitudes and raise public awareness of contemporary social issues like ecology and environmental protection.

The exhibition seeks to present these people to the public as role models, and to inspire our fellow citizens to alter their stance towards environmental issues by adapting their daily lives to the new conditions of our age or by volunteering to work for a better environment individually or as part of a team.

Our 10 protagonists will be honoured a specially-designed, green “EcoHero” Award.

Concept:Effie KomninouCurator:Dionysis LivanisResearch & Texts: Valia Bazou, editor-in-chief of Prasino PontikiPhotography:Konstantinos TrichasEcoHero Award Design:Company

Participating designers:Konstantinos Miaris/ Konsept83 Design StudioEleni BeveratouNoni NeziSebastien NikolaouNatasha Pappaprop4g4nd4 RE:OKSISΤE.TRIS/ Eva Temponera and FilimonasTriantafyllou Konstantinos TrichasIoannis Fetanis

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The Ecoheroes stories:

Vangelis Stogiannis

Some three decades ago, when the words ‘environment’ and ‘ecology’ were at best unknown and at worst viewed with suspicion, Vangelis Stogiannis had already left his mark as a member of New Ecology and the Greek chapter of the Friends of the Earth. In 2000, he turned his attention to Kaisariani, dedicating himself to protecting magical Mount Hymettus. A regular member of the municipality’s Volunteer Forest Protection team, he knows every inch of the forest after a decade of fire patrols. Every summer he is on the ready, and when a fire breaks out in any corner of Greece and his help is needed, Vangelis is there. In winter, he and the other members of the Volunteer Forest Protection team help in the planting of new trees, and share their knowledge and love of the environment with parties of schoolchildren.

Designer: Ioannis Fetanis

Pavlos Gerardos

It was back in the summer of 2006 that Pavlos Gerardos, seeing that he had put on a bit of extra weight, decided to buy a bicycle. He started off cycling between home and work two or three times a week, but the loneliness of the endeavour meant he quickly grew bored with it and dumped his bicycle in the family’s yard. The bike disappeared a little later, but his love for cycling grew and grew, developing into a lifelong relationship. The following summer, Pavlos and his friend Kostas bought bikes and started to crisscross Attica together. Since then, all his daily movements—going to work, out for a drink, to the theatre or cinema—have been made by bicycle, twelve months a year. Pavlos covers some 30 kilometres on an average day in Athens, and hopes that the person who stole his first bike has come to enjoy cycling as much as him.

Designer: prop4g4nd4

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Eleni Varvitsioti

Eleni Varvitsioti is certainly one of the few people who can still manage to surprise us, and fully deserves to be hailed as ‘The Mother of Recycling’! A homemaker, mother and grandmother, she lives in Agios Dimitrios and knows everything there is to be known about the life-cycle and rebirth of theoretically useless objects. At home, Eleni, helped by her grandson Dimitris, diligently sorts paper, glass, aluminium, batteries, old electrical appliances and even used cooking oil (when she doesn’t make it into soap, that is!). Then she devotes equal care to putting all this useful rubbish into the special municipal bins. What’s more, Eleni does not abandon her recycling principles when she goes to her village on holiday: her children know their car will be filled with bags of paper, cans and glass on their way to the recycling bins back home in Brachami, and wouldn’t dream of helping their mother stay true to her ideals.

Designer: Noni Nezi

Giannis Kotakis

Standing up to bureaucracy is heroic in itself, but even more so when you have to visit dozens of offices to get a permit to install a photovoltaic system in one’s home. Mechanical engineer Giannis Kotakis dared take up the challenge and emerged victorious, becoming the first Greek citizen to hook his house up to the Greek grid and selling the electricity it generates to the Public Power Corporation. Giannis believed in the potential of this renewable energy source and was not bowed by the difficulties he encountered. His detached home in Pallini has been connected since November 2009, and has to date fed some 4,800 kWh of clean solar energy into the network. He has thus contributed in the most tangible way to the bid to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, and done more than his bit in the battle against climate change.

Designer: Konstantinos Miaris | Konsept83 Design Studio


Alexandros Athanasopoulos,Ilias Kaimakamis,Konstantinos Kaliakoudas, Anna Tzavara,Giannis Epitropakis andSpyros Kounadis

When most of us catch sight of broken CD or DVD players, bits from old computers and damaged hard drives, we see only rubbish. Luckily, thanks to their imagination and inspiration, plus much-needed expert guidance,five youngsters — Alexandros Athanasopoulos, Ilias Kaimakamis, Konstantinos Kaliakoudas, Anna Tzavara and Giannis Epitropakis—saw works of art and items that could be used. Their guide and mentor: their teacher, Spyros Kounadis.The results were exceptional: a light fitting literally rescued from our rubbish. It was not by chance that these students from the 14th Junior High School of Peristeri received first prize in the Recycling Art competition held by the Hellenic ministries of the environment and education.

Designer: Eleni Beveratou

Athanasios Tsiokas- Plapoutas

Ten years ago, the life of lawyer Athanasios Tsiokas-Plapoutas was struck by tragedy when his 33-year-old son, Dimitris, an electrical engineer, went for a drive and never returned. The cause of his accident: one of the illegal billboards by the side of the Athens high-speed ring road: Katechaki Avenue. Transforming his grief into determination, Mr Tsiokas-Plapoutas singlehandedly embarked on a legal marathon to have the illegal billboards, which had posed a deadly risk to Athens motorists for a decade, removed. The case went all the way to the Supreme Court, which vindicated Mr Athanassios Tsiokas-Plapoutas’ struggle. However, although the ministries of Infrastructure and the Environment began taking down the billboards just a few months ago, the problem remains with millions of illegallyerected billboards still scattered across the country. In response, Mr Tsiokas-Plapoutas now runs www.diadromi.com, a website with detailed up-to-date information on illegal billboards, as well as more general information on road safety issues.

Designer: ΤE.TRIS/ Eva Temponera and Filimonas Triantafyllou


Lunch Street Party

They are young, tuned in and full of imagination. They love the city they live in, but it hurts them. They want to make their lives more beautiful and to feel more human. They want to take action and demand what was once taken for granted: public space. Determined to lay claim to every inch of Athenian earth which its residents can breathe new life into, they created the Lunch Street Party, a new type of Athens activism. What they do is set up parties in a different public space each time, with eating and drinking, tables and chairs, and people bringing the food, drink and music from home. As they put it on their blog (http://lunchstreetparty.blogspot.com), “the Lunch Street Party is a way for us to intervene in our abused public space, and transform a miserable street, an abandoned square. All the collective work culminates in a feast”.

Designer: Konstantinos Trichas

Amalia Zepou

For Mrs Amalia Zepou, a vacant plot filled with rubbish, rubble and dead animals would become the ideal laboratory for putting something to the test: how long could someone live alongside the filth without being bothered by it, without lifting a finger to do something about it? The building plot was in downtown Athens, opposite Mrs Zepou’s house in Kerameikos. She began by calling the municipality in an attempt to locate the property’s owner, but when she realized time just kept rolling by, she decided to act alone. And she never looked back. Without any fanfare, without asking the neighbours to help, without the tale evolving into a movement, she simply called in a bulldozer and started cleaning up the plot. She began at five in the morning, which got the whole neighbourhood up... and interested. Two young people told her it was “great you woke us up for that” and started helping her move the rubbish. However, rubbish—which seemed to materialize out of thin air—began to clog the clean plot again soon after… at which point Ms Zepou wondered whether the “(in)visible hand might choose the rubbish bin next time round” if they planted flowers. Which is how a rubbish-filled plot became the neighbourhood garden.

Designer: Natasha Pappa


Athanasios Panteloglou

Thanasis Panteloglou, the man who discovered one of Greece’s most serious environmental problems, the polluting of the Asopos River with depleted chromium, a known carcinogen, doesn’t call himself an ecologist, opting for the humorous “environmental criminologist” instead. For most people, however, Mr Panteloglou is the chemical / biochemical engineer who first realized back in 1999 that there was something amiss with the water in Oinofyta. As a scientist, he began to investigate the matter further, confirming the presence of pollution caused by heavy metals in the water table. On his own initiative, he began to inform the authorities and citizens of the dangers posed by their drinking water, giving talks and organising rallies in his efforts to force someone in authority to take an interest. He even informed Erin Brockovich, the American environmental activist, about it in a bid to obtain further information. And Mr Panteloglou did not back down, even when threatened or taunted. In 2007, he sent water samples to the Greek state laboratory, who officially confirmed that the pollution had been caused by depleted chromium, vindicating his efforts. Subsequent action on the part of residents and the authorities led to initial measures being taken.

Designer: RE:OKSIS

oikologio.gr

Until the summer of 2007, no one had realized the power of SMS text messages and the activity that could be generated by a blog. Until then, no one would have believed that thousands of citizens could gather, clad in black, in Syntagma Square to protest the destruction of their environment. It was the summer when Greece was brought to its knees by forest fires that a group of concerned and environmentally-aware citizens decided to set up anadasosi.blogspot.com, which would prove the first step towards the creation of oikologio.gr, Greece’s ‘electronic piazza’. And this is the power of the new media: it can unite people who do not know one another and spur them on to collective action. As the site’s administrators write: “Imagine a neighbourhood, or better still a piazza, where people can talk to one another about environmental action, bringing what unites us to the fore and setting aside what divides us. Imagine a square with slogans written everywhere relating to ecology, nature and life. That square is oikologio.gr”.

Designer: Sebastien Nikolaou

Asopos River Distress Message Board

Few signatures for huge problem!Mario Allessini

Stop the pollution!!!Hans Buchel

No water, No future!

Οι αρχαίοι Έλληνες λάτρευαν τον Ασωπό ως Θεό.Σοφία Γιαννάκη

We need the river!Jamie Byres

Is anybody listening?

Οχι άλλα βιομηχανικά απόβλητα!Μάρκος Ρίζος

Από τους 18 κατηγορούμενους, οι 10 απαλλάχτηκανλόγω λάθους στην καταγραφή στοιχείων!

asopossos.wordpress.com

The river’s chromium content is 400,000 times the permissible level!www.portokalada.com

Μας δείχνουν το δέντρο, για μας να κρύψουν το δάσος!Δέσποινα Πάσσαλη

Χρειάζεται άμεση μεθόδευση παράλληλης δουλειάςτώρα για να γίνουν ΠΡΑΓΜΑΤΙΚΕΣ-ΑΛΗΘΙΝΕΣ

οι άδειες και όχι να παραμείνουν «Μαϊμού».Ανοικτό forum για το περιβαλλοντικό έγκλημα

Tο εξασθενές χρώμιο, όταν βρίσκεται σεσυγκεντρώσεις της τάξεως των 20 μg/λ, είναι βέβαιο

ότι προέρχεται από ανθρωπογενή ρύπανση.Γιάννης Zαμπετάκης

Στους ποταμούς αυτούς πρωτο-αναπτύχθηκε ο ανθρώπινος πολιτισμός. Εμείς σήμερα "ανταποδίδουμε" το καλό που μας έκαναν...Παπα-Γιάννης Οικονομίδης

Ο δήμος έχει ζητήσει, με ηλεκτρονική επιστολή,από την Αμερικανίδα ακτιβίστρια, Έριν Μπρόκοβιτς,να

αναλάβει την υπόθεση. Η Μπρόκοβιτς ανταποκρίθηκε άμεσακαι ζήτησε μέσω μηνύματός της στη σελίδα του κινήματοςFriends of the Earth τη συλλογή υπογραφών για αποστολή

μηνύματος στον Αμερικανό πρέσβη στην Ελλάδα, με τοοποίο θα του ζητείται να ασκήσει πίεση στην ελληνική

κυβέρνηση για λύση του προβλήματος.http://el.wikipedia.org

Nos enfants vallent un meilleur futur!Cyril Fontaine

give life a chance!

Το εξασθενές χρώμιο περνά στον ανθρώπινο οργανισμόκαταστρέφοντας την υγεία ανθρώπων & ζώων.

Ασπασία Κοντού

Σταματήστε να καταστρέφετε την Ελλάδα μας!Θανάσης Ψάλτης

"ΝΟ" to profit over pollution. logic needs to prevail.Chris Sokos

Καθαρό νερό της ΕΥΔΑΠ θα πίνουν σε περίπου δυο μήνες οι κάτοικοι στην ευρύτερη περιοχή του Ασωπού.

TΟ ΒΗΜA

Δικό μας έργο ήταν η ανίχνευση & ανάδειξη του προβλήματος... Γεώργιος Αλαχούζος

Οικολογική Ποιότητα Ασωπού Ποταμού

Καλή

Επιστήμων

Cr6+ 76Co 28Ni 31Fe 140Ba 2.000Mn 12ΤΑ ΟΡΙΑ:Cr6+ Εξασθενές χρώμιο* —Co Κοβάλτιο 0 μgr/λίτροNi Νικέλιο 0 μgr/λίτροFe Σίδηρος 200 μgr/λίτροBa Βάριο 0 μgr/λίτροMn Μαγγάνιο 50 μgr/λίτρο* Δεν Υπάρχει όριο καθώς θεωρείται καρκινογόνο


Οινόφυτα


Ωρωπός


Μέτρια Ελλιπής Κακή

Προέλευση Μήνυματων

Xημικές AναλύσειςCr6+ 76Co 28Ni 31Fe 140Ba 2.000Mn 12

ΕΠΙΤΡΕΠΤΑ ΟΡΙΑ:

Cr6+ Εξασθενές χρώμιο* – –Co Κοβάλτιο 0 μgr/λίτροNi Νικέλιο 0 μgr/λίτροFe Σίδηρος 200 μgr/λίτροBa Βάριο 0 μgr/λίτροMn Μαγγάνιο 50 μgr/λίτρο

* Δεν υπάρχει όριο καθώς θεωρείται καρκινογόνο

Cr6+ 148Co 24Ni 9Fe 420Ba 1.800Mn 120

Cr6+ 70Co 12Ni 13Fe 30Ba 3.000Mn 18

Cr6+ 107Co 11Ni 28Fe 360Ba 1.200Mn 157

Μέσα Ενημέρωσης Διαδίκτυο Φόρουμ Ιδιώτες

Οι κάτοικοι συνεχίζουν να πίνουν μολυσμένο νερό, παρά το γεγονός ότι ο δήμος έχει ζητήσει εδώ και μήνες να ενταχθεί στο δίκτυο της ΕΥΔΑΠ.nature.ert.gr

Ο πληθυσμός της Κεντρικής Εύβοιας φτάνεισυνολικά τους 130.000 κατοίκους

Αθανάσιος Παντελόγλου

23I SEE GREEN

OPEN GREEN LIBRARYA green al fresco reading room entitled ‘we saw a green city’ with approximately 200 books for all ages whose themes relate to design and the environment, plus publications ranging from comics and children’s books to coffee table books and academic studies.

Design-wise, wooden shuttering planks form an impression of the contemporary city. Building outlines take shape mentally on two levels to produce an abstract rendering of the city view. The viewer intervenes in this picture. The city is stifled, confined between the built crests; above it, in marked contrast, the greenery represses their crests as though it wants to smash them and reclaim its place in the urban landscape.

Green Design Festival’s library is open to all and attempts to create a different urban image accompanied by the fitting soundscape provided by the adjacent audio installation entitled “Αkou ti Αkous” [listen, what’s that you can hear].

Αkou ti akous: 24 hours in Athens at 24 points in the city with 24 different soundscapes. According to statistics, Greek cities suffer the highest levels of noise pollution in Europe. Every day, we hear a lot more than we think. Thanks to the ‘cocktail party effect’—hearing’s instinctive ability to focus—we continually filter the aural stimuli we receive. At the same time, we do not realize just how much noise pollution there is all around us. The installation seeks to sensitize the public to noisepollution. Wearing headphones, the visitor listens to a loop consisting of 24 Athens soundscapes—one for each hour of the day—which invite the visitor to exercise his or her hearing by placing sounds within the aural complexity of the Greek capital.

Design: we saw | open lab

24I SEE GREEN

MEDITERRANEAN GARDENA specially designed exhibit: a ‘miniature’ landscape we could all create on our balconies, in our gardens, in our cities.

Landscapes that go beyond traditional garden design move our conventional way of seeing things forward, forcing us to expand our perception of familiar open spaces into a new way of understanding our environment. We need to make our cities more liveable, and to nurture ecological awareness by transferring our knowledge of simple solutions to a dab of green in our immediate environment. Combined with innovative planting design, the use of indigenous Mediterranean plants species in the Ecomuseum could promote the idea of sustainable landscapes in the urban fabric. Species like rosemary, myrtle, thyme, lavender, cypress, olive and lemon trees trigger landscapes of memory—the enclosed gardens of traditional neighbourhoods in Greek towns, Peloponnesian hillsides or Aegean islands. These plants need little water or maintenance, and are resistant to atmospheric pollution.

Landscape Design: Eva Papadimitriou / outside landscape architects

25I SEE GREEN

GREEN SCREENINGSThe moving image has the power to affect and inspire us more than any other medium. Watching an oil spill spread, literally seeing the consequences of climate change, one is more directly engaged by environmental issues than when reading about them. Double Decker has curated a strand of screenings that shows how important questions of ecology are in the work of film-makers worldwide. Green Screenings has been designed to intrigue, provoke and entertain rather than to advance a particular thesis. Indeed, Green Screenings reveals the plethora of different approaches to ecological themes, and positions on the causes of, and solutions to, environmental problems that film-makers have adopted. Green Screenings has been carefully constructed by Double Decker to assay a critical examination not just of ecological issues but of the way we think about ecology and of ‘ecology’ as a socially and culturally-constructed set of practices and ideals….. Is then “thinking ecologically” something that has only begun recently? Is it just a trend? Could ecology be a new religion or is it simply a pragmatic way of addressing everyday life? Green Screenings presents the audience with the opportunity to learn, think, decide and act.

Daily: 20:00-22:00 in the Ecomuseum amphitheatre

Curators:Double Decker(Wilhelm Finger, Melita Skamnaki)

26I SEE GREEN

GREEN DESIGN FESTIVAL IN THE CITYEYE OPENER (WINDOW TO THE FUTURE)

The solution to climate change does not relate to the future alone; it must begin with an improvement in our present reality. The aptly named “Eye Openers” series of installations shows how Athenians’ daily life could be changed by design. In this way, an ecological redesign of both the urban environment and the built environment is proposed.

Where you may see the ‘Eye-Openers’:Kaningos Square, Klathmonos Square, Solonos & Asklipiou, Kifissias & Alexandras Avenues, Omonia Square, Syngrou Ave & Athanasiou Diakou, Syntagma Square

Eyeopeners Design:gfra architecturePhotography:Fotis Traganoudakis

27I SEE GREEN

EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMSActionAid Hellas is taking part in the Green Design Festival with educational programmes for schools. The programmes provide students with the opportunity to play, discuss and enter into a creative dialogue with the exhibits and green ideasshowcased in the Ecomuseum. There is a powerful link between our everyday habits, climate change and global poverty, and ActionAid proposes local actions with a potentially global impact.

The educational programs are designed for pupils attending 4th to 9th grade (9-14 years of age). Interested schools should contact ActionAid to reserve places on 210 9212321 (10:00-17:00).

On Sunday 10 October, ActionAid will be staging workshops for children and adults in collaboration with the Greek Climate Advocates, a British Council initiative. The workshops are part of the global 10:10 campaign which is open to all and seeks to reduce our ecological footprint by 10% within a year. So far, 90,000 people in 128 countries have committed themselves to accomplishing this goal (http://1010global.org).

The Green Design Festival educational programs are based on the ActionAid “Climate Change and Poverty” educational pack which has already been sent out to all Greek elementary schools. Copies of the educational pack will be available in the Green Design Festival library for anyone who would like to study it, and can also be downloaded from http://www.actionaid.gr/kontrastoreuma.

Mr. CO2

28I SEE GREEN

A CLIMATE FRENDLY-CARBON NEUTRAL FESTIVALClimate change is one of the greatest challenge now facing our global community and through our ongoing partnership with the specialist company Green Evolution, Brainlab is making a long term commitment to carbon emissions practices and this will be revealed through the 2010 report “GDF carbon footprint: Management and Reduction Plan”. Green Evolution will track down all emission sources and account of all emissions associated with the GDF Event, according to the GHG international protocol. Emissions which fall within the organizers responsibility boundary will be accounted through this standard and will be offset following the procedures of Green Evolution’s “CO2 Neutral Seal” new System which allows full transparency of the offset procedure.

The aim of this partnership and in particular of the report which will document it, is to present a true sustainable approach for a wider audience.

30ΒΛΕΠΩ ΠΡΑΣΙΝΟ23.9 / 10.10IN SYNTAGMASQUAREAND IN THECITY OF ATHENS

www.greendesignfestival.gr

I SEEGREEN

Press Officer: Vicky Nitsopoulou, [email protected], (+30) 6982175942

GREEN DESIGN FESTIVAL 2010 PRESS RELEASE

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Transcript of GREEN DESIGN FESTIVAL 2010 PRESS RELEASE