The award to McDonough recognizes "excellence, innovation, and lasting achievement."
McDonough and his companies are known in the design world as leaders in sustainable design. The designs honored by this award demonstrate tangible methods for achieving environmental progress, by design, with conventional budgets and commercial timelines.
McDonough and his companies practice "cradle-to-cradle design," which is means designers go beyond retrofitting systems to reduce the damage they create. The approach is perceived by business as the next step in the Total Quality Management movement.
McDonough's work includes the first "green office" in the United States for Environmental Defense (ED) in New York (1985); offices for Gap Inc. in San Bruno, Calif. that feature an undulating green roof (1993); the revitalization of Ford Motor Company's historic Rouge Center industrial complex, home to the world's largest green roof (2003) and the Herman Miller 'Mirra' office chair (2003).
McDonough is the founding principal of William McDonough+Partners. Along with partners Russell Perry, Kevin Burke, Diane Dale and Allison Ewing, the design firm practices ecologically, socially and economically intelligent architecture and planning in the U.S. and abroad. McDonough is also the co-founder and principal, with German chemist Michael Braungart, of MBDC, a product and process design firm assisting companies to design profitable and ecologically intelligent products and systems. Both companies are based in Charlottesville, Va.
In 1996, McDonough received the Presidential Award for Sustainable Development. In 2003, he received a Presidential Award in Green Chemistry for Shaw Inc.'s ecoworx® carpet.
For additional information about the award and this year's recipients, go to http://www.nationaldesignawards.org/.
