Quotes by William McDonough

About William McDonough:

William Andrews McDonough is an American designer, advisor, author, and thought leader. McDonough is founding principal of William McDonough + Partners, co-founder of McDonough Braungart Design Chemistry (MBDC) with German chemist Michael Braungart as well as co-author of Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things and The Upcycle: Beyond Sustainability—Designing for Abundance, also with Braungart. McDonough's career is focused on creating a beneficial footprint. He espouses a message that we can design materials, systems, companies, products, buildings, and communities that continuously improve over time.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Here's where redesign begins in earnest, where we stop trying to be less bad and we start figuring out how to be good.

William McDonough

Ultimately a regulation is a signal of design failure...it is what we call a license to harm: a permit issued by a government to an industry so that it may dispense sickness, destruction, and death at an "acceptable" rate.

William McDonough

Art is about going a little nuts... Kids do art for fun. It's playing.

William McDonough

The magic question is, 'What for?' But art is not for anything. Art is the ultimate goal.

William McDonough

We are all born artists... Almost everything kids do is art.

William McDonough

We achieved our mission to the moon. Let's look home from that lofty perch and reimagine our mission on Earth - that is what we need to do here. Together, we can upcycle everything. The world will be better for our positive visions and actions.

William McDonough

Design is inherently optimistic. That is its power.

William McDonough

I suggest we take our heads out of the tar sands and look up to see the sun. We don't own it, but it provides us all with great, endless value. So, too, the wind. These free, renewable sources of 'energy currency' are perfect partners to what we own ...

William McDonough

I see that idea that we need a new form as something critical. I mean, we do need to invent and not be benchmarking all the time. That's important to me.

William McDonough

I am very focused on large-scale deployments of renewable power and how we're going to get this done. Imagine our military bases covered with solar thermal collectors that could generate steam and electricity.

William McDonough

I think the job of an original designer is to inspire.

William McDonough

Not everything needs to be recycled.

William McDonough

If you continue to act like an artist as you get older, you'll increasingly feel pressure. People will question your actions.

William McDonough

We get jealous not because we're evil, but because we have little artists pent up inside us.

William McDonough

Author Bio

  • NameWilliam McDonough
  • DescriptionAmerican architect
  • BornFebruary 21, 1951
  • CountryUnited States Of America
  • ProfessionArchitect; Author
  • AwardsNational Design Awards