Rating: 
Summary: The emperors wear no clothes
Review: The claims by this (dis)pair of techies' are not substantiated anywhere in the book, nothing on architecture or engineering or their own designs, they only invoke them and pronounce them as being soooo goooood, no plans, no sketches, no peer reviews, no peer studies, no utilization studies or numbers, no cost analysis, no techniques or methods, nada, zippo, only claims are made very skewed towards the *biggest* huge corporations, hype, lip service, starting with the claim for the book material as being a new polymer quote "possibly recyclable," polymers come from fossil oil, hardly a renewable or sustainable resource - duh - at least three times the density of paper, air planes, freight and transportation use more gas to fly heavier stuff - bigger duh - heavy stuff really, very unconfortable to sit with and read, the book feels heavier than a brick of aluminum, and nothing I will ever toss into my backpack, way too heavy, leaves me with a static cling in the hands afterwards that needs handwashing - no kidding, they raise some important questions true - basically that's all the authors do, but nothing that hasn't been raised somewhere else by many better, more extensively and much better documented, the english has a silky, smooth, schomoozed feel as not to upset anyone, common of the past and contemporary disguized arrogance of designers and architects - go spend your moola on adobe, strawbale, solar energy, passive design, greywater, compost toilets, organic food, which the authors do not touch at all - not worth the (snake) oil it is printed on, and yes, buy good old paper, from a sustainable tree harvest, chlorine free, printed with inks sans heavy metals - it will last many lifetimes lovingly and beautifully
Rating: 
Summary: Don't judge a book by its cover
Review: The most compelling aspect of this book is the fact that it is a Durabook, printed on recyclable plastic "paper" that saves trees and results in waterproof pages so that you can quite literally take this book anywhere you go. It is too bad McDonough and Braungart didn't give as much attention to their narrative, which reads as a blatant piece of self-promotion.The authors have established a good reputation for themselves in recent years, successfully promoting their green ideas on Ford Motor Company, Nike and other high profile companies. But, this book woefully comes up short in terms of ideas, as it reads like a screed on green consciousness, rather than a helpful guide to gaining greater eco-awareness, especially in terms of the built environment. I was looking for at least one demonstration of their ideas in terms of resource material, but there is none. We are simply led to believe that McDonough and Braungart have carried out successful projects with green consciousness in mind. Contrast this with books like Ecological Design by Sim Van Der Ryn and The Green Skyscraper by Ken Yeang, and you will see what I mean. Van Der Ryn and Yeang provide vital information in terms of how they have successfully built sustainable buildings. Yeang maybe a little too heavily as he offers much in terms of raw data on his innovative high-rise buildings that readers might find tedious. But, if you are like me, these are the books you are looking for. Cradle to Cradle is little more than a clever advertisement for McDonough and Braungart.
Rating:
Summary: Great packaging, disappointing content
Review: The most interesting thing about this book is the way it was made. I kept waiting for the authors to really get into the topic but it never seemed to happen. I had just read "The Skeptical Environmentalist" before this book so I was particularly aware of the stories the authors of this book used to support their claims. I totally agree with their concepts, but there is not enough in this book to get engaged with.
Rating: 
Summary: Thinking Outside the Box
Review: The White House in its search for an energy policy would do well to read this book. McDonough is one of those visionary thinkers who continually challenge conventional wisdom. Many of the ideas here cause one to immediately say, "Yes, why have'nt we done that before? It's so simple." The authors are not just speaking to environmental and/or energy concerns, but are trying to point us in a new direction that embraces the whole system in the lineage of R.Buckminster Fuller, the inventor of the geodesic dome and the the originator of the term, "spaceship earth." Braungart and Mcdonough are not just whistling "Dixie" here, but are actually walking their talk, as they implement the principles they espouse in organizations as diverse as Ford Motors,Herman Miller,Pendleton and the city of Chicago among a host of others.The subtitle of the book is "Remaking the Way We Make Things." It could have been,"Recreating the Way We See the World,"because their perspective encompasses the whole system,and is not limited by parochial thinking and short term "fixes"that are the major obstacle to meeting and solving the major challenges we face on planet Earth. Everyone who truly cares about the future we leave for our grandchildren's grandchildren needs to read Cradle to cradle.
Rating:
Summary: Abundance in Action
Review: This book is a fantastic document of William McDonough and Michael Braungart's commitment to solution. The first half of the book illustrates the overwhelmingly toxic and seemingly insurmountable world we have created through industry and the pursuit of progress. Then, through innovation, action and compassion, the authors outline, define and remind us toward obtainable solutions. At times, poetic, at times complex, like nature. This book sets itself apart from others not only in its subject matter, but in its manufacture, as stated in the opening pages: "This book is not a tree". The pages are made from synthetic "paper"...truly remaking the way we make things.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting ideas
Review: This book is a sometimes interesting, often meandering treatise on design. The authors, and American architect and a German chemist, have a very sincere desire to realign the world of design of objects and buildings so that they contribute to the betterment of the environment rather than destroy it. The title of the book "Cradle to Cradle" encapsulates their goal of designing objects that when they are no longer needed, naturally become useful inputs for the production of other objects rather than getting sent to the grave (or buried in a landfill). For example, they would like to see the creation of food packaging that could be thrown on the ground when the contents are consumed and would become fertilizer rather than non-biodegradable litter. (By this measure, the women concessionaires selling steamed rice treats in Indonesian trains are masters of design. The rice is both steamed and packaged in banana leafs, which are simply thrown out the train windows once the rice is consumed. But this practice also creates enormous problems- -since Indonesians have been accustomed to using such environmentally beneficial packaging for generations, they assume that "modern" packaging can be discarded in the same manner, much to the detriment of the Indonesian countryside. If you are living in a world of mixed packaging, some of which can be thrown out the window, and some of which must be discarded by other means, it's hard to keep straight which stuff goes where. That's a vital cultural issue that the authors don't explore here.) McDounough and Braungart list the goals for their design program. They challenge inventors and industry leaders to design factories that "produce more energy than they consume, and purify their own waste water," and products that "can be tossed on the ground to decompose" or become "high-quality raw materials for new products" rather than simply "down-cycled". At the outset, these goals can sound a bit far-fetched. After, all, a factory that produces more energy than it consumes would seem to violate the Second Law of Thermodynamics. But what the authors really mean here is not that the factory would miraculously produce something from nothing, but that the design of the factory would include such things as solar collectors on the roof and devices to capture heat that could then send energy back out to the power grid, perhaps even in excess of electrical energy coming in. They illustrate their lofty dreams with concrete designs that they have helped develop and implement, such as a cosmetics plant in Germany whose wastewater is actually cleaner than the water coming in to the plant, thanks to the new chemical formulations they recommended. What's more, they point out that such design efforts can be even be good for business, since in this particular example, the company was able to cut costs on hazardous materials handling and storage enough to more than offset slightly increased production costs with the new formulas. Such design efforts are fabulous examples of the potential benefits of thinking "out of the box". The book contains quite a few additional examples of brilliant design ideas that can save resources as well as money. The book is also filled with surprising tidbits that haven't become general knowledge yet, like the potential hazards of wearing fabric made of recycled plastic bottles, and the fact that PET bottles were found to leach antimony when used as soap containers. The authors point out that the decision to use either recycled paper or virgin paper is not as clear cut as it seems- -while the production of virgin paper necessitates the cutting down of trees, recycling paper requires enormous amounts of bleaching, which produces PCBs. To demonstrate an alternative, the book itself is printed on a paper-free composite of plastics, which could be easily recycled into more book-grade plastics. The informative details and design goals of the book are quite interesting. However, the text often meanders around and through topics that are at best tangential or described better in other volumes. At times, some details or issues are also rehashed repetitively. In these places, it would have been better to focus on explicating McDonough and Braungart's own design program more fully. They've got some neat ideas that are well worth exploring, and it would have been great to be able to read even more about them and less about the general problems of environmental destruction that are described better in other books.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting ideas
Review: This book is a sometimes interesting, often meandering treatise on design. The authors, and American architect and a German chemist, have a very sincere desire to realign the world of design of objects and buildings so that they contribute to the betterment of the environment rather than destroy it. The title of the book "Cradle to Cradle" encapsulates their goal of designing objects that when they are no longer needed, naturally become useful inputs for the production of other objects rather than getting sent to the grave (or buried in a landfill). For example, they would like to see the creation of food packaging that could be thrown on the ground when the contents are consumed and would become fertilizer rather than non-biodegradable litter. (By this measure, the women concessionaires selling steamed rice treats in Indonesian trains are masters of design. The rice is both steamed and packaged in banana leafs, which are simply thrown out the train windows once the rice is consumed. But this practice also creates enormous problems- -since Indonesians have been accustomed to using such environmentally beneficial packaging for generations, they assume that "modern" packaging can be discarded in the same manner, much to the detriment of the Indonesian countryside. If you are living in a world of mixed packaging, some of which can be thrown out the window, and some of which must be discarded by other means, it's hard to keep straight which stuff goes where. That's a vital cultural issue that the authors don't explore here.) McDounough and Braungart list the goals for their design program. They challenge inventors and industry leaders to design factories that "produce more energy than they consume, and purify their own waste water," and products that "can be tossed on the ground to decompose" or become "high-quality raw materials for new products" rather than simply "down-cycled". At the outset, these goals can sound a bit far-fetched. After, all, a factory that produces more energy than it consumes would seem to violate the Second Law of Thermodynamics. But what the authors really mean here is not that the factory would miraculously produce something from nothing, but that the design of the factory would include such things as solar collectors on the roof and devices to capture heat that could then send energy back out to the power grid, perhaps even in excess of electrical energy coming in. They illustrate their lofty dreams with concrete designs that they have helped develop and implement, such as a cosmetics plant in Germany whose wastewater is actually cleaner than the water coming in to the plant, thanks to the new chemical formulations they recommended. What's more, they point out that such design efforts can be even be good for business, since in this particular example, the company was able to cut costs on hazardous materials handling and storage enough to more than offset slightly increased production costs with the new formulas. Such design efforts are fabulous examples of the potential benefits of thinking "out of the box". The book contains quite a few additional examples of brilliant design ideas that can save resources as well as money. The book is also filled with surprising tidbits that haven't become general knowledge yet, like the potential hazards of wearing fabric made of recycled plastic bottles, and the fact that PET bottles were found to leach antimony when used as soap containers. The authors point out that the decision to use either recycled paper or virgin paper is not as clear cut as it seems- -while the production of virgin paper necessitates the cutting down of trees, recycling paper requires enormous amounts of bleaching, which produces PCBs. To demonstrate an alternative, the book itself is printed on a paper-free composite of plastics, which could be easily recycled into more book-grade plastics. The informative details and design goals of the book are quite interesting. However, the text often meanders around and through topics that are at best tangential or described better in other volumes. At times, some details or issues are also rehashed repetitively. In these places, it would have been better to focus on explicating McDonough and Braungart's own design program more fully. They've got some neat ideas that are well worth exploring, and it would have been great to be able to read even more about them and less about the general problems of environmental destruction that are described better in other books.
Rating:
Summary: Very Disappointed
Review: This book touches on a very interesting topic and has a great deal of potential; unfortunately this book is a real disappointment. This book makes many strong claims about the state of the environment with out backing them up with sources. Rather than citing facts from a reliable source the authors opt for harsh adjectives, which any knowledgeable reader will not take seriously. The authors touch on topic after topic without following up there claims, stories, ideas and previous work. Case in point, they talk about a well designed Brazil waste treatment system project that Mr. Michael Braungart worked on, but give no update of the state of the project today. Jumping from topic to topic this book does not read smoothly, and many times I felt frustrated and unsatisfied. They discussed the positive results of some of the projects they were involved in or headed, but they only used figures twice to back up their claims. Most of the time they briefly described their work, and offered no data, no comparisons nor any cost analysis showing the benefits.
I was hoping to see some more concrete examples, including some numbers, statistics and graphs. For example, some type of cost comparison of the designs, techniques and systems used by the authors versus modern mainstream conventional designs, techniques and systems was probably the most crucial missing piece of this book. In addition, an actual example of long term savings achieved by using the eco-friendly systems and designs proposed by the authors would have been convincing for skeptical readers; none were given. Instead I received very little new information, and the new interesting information that was found in the book was not followed up and the reader is forced to follow up these leads by reading other material. The lone bright spot was the construction of the book, which was quite unique. I have no doubt that Mr. McDonough and Mr. Braungart are leaders in their respective fields, but this is a poorly written book.
Rating:
Summary: Visionary Environmentalism
Review: This doesn't feel like a book - literally. It's a different size and shape, the pages are thick, the thing feels significantly heavier than it looks, and it's waterproof. The design of the book is making a point also made in the text of the book: the current state of recycling generally turns higher quality products into lower quality ones useful only for purposes other than the original product, and then eventually discards them. This is not recycling; it's slow motion waste. "Cradle to Cradle," the object, is intended to be easily and completely recyclable into a new book of the same quality. "Cradle to cradle," the phrase, is contrasted to "cradle to grave." "Cradle to Cradle," the text, argues in favor of making all human productions either recyclable in the way this book is or completely biodegradable so that they can be used as fertilizer. In the future envisioned and partially created and described by this pair of authors, packaging will be tossed on the ground in response to signs reading "Please litter!" Appliances will be leased and returned to manufacturers to be completely recycled. Objects that must contain both biodegradable and inorganic recyclable elements will be easily separable into those respective parts: you'll toss the soles of your shoes into the garden and give the uppers back to the shoemaker. And the water coming out of factories will be cleaner than what came in, motivating the factory owners to reuse it and eliminating the need for the government to test its toxicity. These authors teemed up on the 1991 Hannover Principles to guide the design of the 2000 World's Fair. McDonough has an architecture firm in Charlottesville, Va., and from 1994 to 1999 was dean of the University of Virginia's School of Architecture. Braungart is a German chemist who for several years headed the chemistry section of Greenpeace. This book is superb and should be read by those familiar with the issues of environmental design and those completely new to the topic. It draws on themes common in a long list of books ranging from "Ishmael," by Daniel Quinn to "Natural Capitalism," by Paul Hawken, Amory Lovins, and L. Hunter Lovins. But McDonough and Braungart make no acknowledgements of any such influences and present themselves (just as these other authors have) as the vanguard of a change as radical as the industrial revolution. Their idea is incredibly important and well stated, but it's not the clear break from current environmental (or for that matter industrial or "Third Way") thinking that they maintain - and for students of evolution why should it need to be, what's wrong with evolving our thinking a helpful bit further, as they have done? What McD and B propose as revolutionary is -- instead of reducing pollution and consumption and having fewer children -- making increased economic activity actually beneficial to the planet. Three comments. First, this book does not suggest any radical change in behavior for the typical reader. (Have lots of kids, drive lots of cars, buy lots of stuff - what a break through!) This book is, rather, advice for architects, corporations, and municipalities. It is intended to free the typical reader of guilt. I think it should do something else as well, namely urge us to political action, to demanding of our democratically elected representatives that the earth-saving innovations described in the book be taken advantage of. All the descriptions in this book of common household objects, such as sofas, "off-gasing" toxic particles makes me want to take action to change things or at least buy a mask, not go shopping. Second, the examples of new materials and building and product designs described in the book all build on the environmental thinking that McD and B so loudly reject. Reducing pollution to zero is not a "new paradigm" from reducing pollution to a teeny bit - it's just better. Third, the vision of rendering mad self-indulgence completely beneficial to all other species is far from a reality, and even the dream described by McD and B would not, in any way that I can imagine, make it possible to place an unlimited number of humans on the planet without hurting anything - more humans than under current practices, yes -- an infinite number, no. But let's remember that most of the people now on the planet do not do nearly as much damage as we do in this country. How many billion Americans the Earth can hold has not been answered. There is also a disturbing thread of anti-government corporatism in the book. Ford and Nike and other corporations for which the authors have worked are described as heroes for their positive efforts, while their destructive practices are passed over. The authors repeat a distinction (citing Jane Jacobs' "Systems of Survival") between Guardians and Commerce, i.e. paternalistic government and noble corporate heroes: "Commerce is quick, highly creative, inventive, constantly seeking short- and long-term advantage, and inherently honest: you can't do business with people if they aren't trustworthy." Is this a joke? Do these guys believe press releases they read from, say, Enron? (Apparently so, because later in the book they write: "...the summer of 2001, when unusually high energy demand in California led to rolling blackouts, skyrocketing prices, even accusations of profiteering...." Accusations! High demand or restrained supply? What rock have these intelligent authors been naturally cooling themselves under? Well, at least they recognize the concept of profiteering, even though it fits poorly with the inherent honesty of commerce.) Immediately following the "inherently honest" comment (page 60) Mc D and B go on to equate regulation with partial pollution reduction, and to conclude that because complete pollution reduction is desirable and possible, regulation is bad. Instead they should conclude that rather than allowing limited pollution, regulators should ban it entirely (through whatever stages of phasing in that policy prove feasible).
Rating:
Summary: Highly Recommended!
Review: This is an extraordinary and unlikely book. It is not printed on paper, but on a waterproof polymer with the heft of good paper and more strength, a substance that reflects the right amount of light, yet holds the ink fast. It seems like an impossible fantasy, but so does much of what the authors propose about design and ecology. They speak with the calm certainty of the ecstatic visionary. Could buildings generate oxygen like trees? Could running shoes release nutrients into the earth? It seems like science fiction. Yet, here is this book, on this paper. The authors make a strong case for change, and just when you're about to say, "if only," they cite a corporation that is implementing their ideas. However, it's hard to believe their concepts would work on a large scale, in the face of powerful economic disincentives. We believe authors do aim some of their criticism at obsolete marketing and manufacturing philosophies, but the overall critique is well worth reading.
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