[ITL] Craft Farm Lab
âLive fast and die youngâ, âWork hard, play harderâ. These phrases are very much prevalent in todayâs busy, technologically commanded and fast world. There is very little time given to âuselessâ tasks like preparing food or even reading a book. This modern world does not encourage sitting back and thinking about the consequences of our actions for ourselves, those around us and the planet we live on. Â
How did we reach this state of life and mind? Some have noticed this overly fast-paced approach to life and the impact itâs having on our environment and population and have decided to use design as a tool to address the decline of the modern world.  Alistair Fuad-Luke, a design activist and writer of 'Slow Design' - a paradigm for living sustainably?" decided to take a new outlook on design thinking; Slow design. The "slow" does not refer to a long, drawn out design process but a meticulous, sustainable and responsible design approach which incorporates the principles of diversity, holism and efficiency for the benefit of the socio-economic and cultural health of the population and the earth. It considers how our actions impact the environment around us and how we can shape design for the better to create a richer and more panoramic experience for everyone without harming our planet or doing any long term damage. It is in direct contrast to this fast paced life we live full of fast food, fast cars and virtual insanity.
According to Malow's Hierarchy of needs, physiological needs like air,water and shelter, are at the core our existence and without their fulfillment, we would not function correctly or in fact, die. The housing crisis is one issue that can starve people of one of their fundamental needs, shelter. There are many projects that aim to demonstrate the slow design principles, one of which is paraSITE, a project by Michael Rakowitz. A controversial but striking and poignant title, this project used the slow design approach to amplify the issue of homelessness in Cambridge, Massachusetts whilst providing somewhere for the homeless to shelter. It was by no means a solution to the housing crisis, but "a symbolic strategy of survival for homeless existence within the city". Â
Physiological needs not only include shelter but of course, food. Â Without food we would die. Unfortunately our fast paced life has led us to neglect the importance of this fundamental need which was once, one of the most important aspect of our social means. Humanity has gone from worshipping grain and offering it as a gift to the gods, to wasting up to 30-40% of the world food supply every year (âCreating a Sustainable Food Future â Reducing Food Loss and Wasteâ â UNEP).Â
The production of food is now a mass industry with five multinational corporations controlling our global food trade - itâs a scary thought. Â The way we treat food, how we grow it and how we dispose of it is unsustainable and with the worldâs population expected to hit 9.6 billion by 2050, we could be in big trouble. It is estimated that it takes 10kcal of exosomatic energy to produce 1kcal of food energy and deliver it to a consumer in the U.S food system! (Originally from a refined study done by David Pimentel and Mario Giampietro in 1994 under the title "Food, Land, Population and the U.S. Economy"). Â Â
What could we do to reduce this wastage? Â How could we contribute our time to work for the better of our local farmers, community and city? This was the inspiration for our project entitled âCraft Farm Labâ, which involves addressing the transparency of the food system and the need for an emphasis on the "quality over quantity" aspect of farming by encouraging the popularity of local produce and the farmhouse âcraftâ branding of products. Â We decided to tackle this area as it is our responsibility as consumers and inhabitors of this planet to try to live as sustainably as possible, reducing our negative effects to the environment and creating a better future for all. Â
You may ask, "How can the primary elements of slow design be applied to Craft Farm branding to increase business for local produce and farmhouse industry?". Â The key aspects of slow design include holism, sustainability, democracy, diversity, adaptability and durability; all of these are relevant to the aims of âCraft Farm Labâ and are crucial to its design process. When considering the effects of increasing the business for local produce and branding, we have to take a holistic approach as this change can have short and long term effects on the agribusiness and our food system, for better (or worse, but we highly doubt this!). The benefits of the project would mean a reduction in harm to our planet and a more sustainable approach by minimising transport of the food from the local grower to the local consumer or supplier and the minimisation of waste by discouraging large scale farms which are more wasteful and produce more CO2 emissions.Â
The transparency of the food system is an issue we aim to tackle within this project and this allows the consumer to see what theyâre buying, where itâs from and how it was grown/raised, adding a democratic aspect as they can choose not to buy something if they donât agree with the production of the product. Â Last of all, the beauty of locally grown food is that it has a distinctive nature and quality about it that will vary from one place to the next. Â Slow design embraces all these qualities and itâs holistic, diverse and sustainable approach are perfect in the design and communication our project.
Food is a very powerful tool which should be celebrated and enjoyed at the centre of our human existence; we wouldn't survive without it, so why abuse it like we are today? âCraft Farm Labâ aims to improve our awareness of the food system and become âfood-thinkersâ, people who think about food, know where itâs coming from and know how to use this food to utilise its nutritional content. Â It aims to encourage the support of local produce and small farm branding, which can be fully utilised through local ânetworksâ or farmers markets. Carolyn Steel coined the term âSitopia, from the ancient Greek, âsitosâ for food, and âtoposâ for placeâ. Â Her vision, like Ebenezer Howardâs âThe Garden Cityâ, is to make food a part of the landscape and the social life of the city once again. âCraft Farm Labâ will aim to take one step forward for this vision and teach us to respect food like we did before.
 http://www.ted.com/talks/carolyn_steel_how_food_shapes_our_cities?language=en