These USPS stamps won’t be available until July of this year, but they are worth getting excited about.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mCQWVn1AfHs&feature=player_embedded#at=72

I am alternately fascinated and horrified by this video. The automation and sophistication on view are amazing. And I am a huge fan of watching an assembly line in action. But that either of these are required to process something as self-contained as an egg, tells me something is terribly terribly wrong. And from what I know about factory farming, I am pretty sure that I’m right about this one. It’s all about volume.

The Renault 4 is turning 50 years old! Happy Anniversary!! Over 8 million vehicles were sold between 1961 and 1992, when Renault finally decided to retire the design. One of the interesting facts about this car is that during its 30+ year production run, the design itself remained virtually the same. The size and shape were a constant. This philosophy exists in total defiance of today’s approach to design, whereby marketing has wrested control of industry. Products change (not everything, but almost everything) simply for the sake of change. Not necessarily to make them better, but in the service of selling more. Not these babies.

For more pictures go here.

And thanks designboom for running this story.

Paul Hawken first wrote this book in 1994. I don’t think any of us need to be told that a lot has changed since then.  So, in 2010, he revised the original book to make it more timely. Not sure if what he was saying in the 90s had lost any of its potency, but the newly revised edition brings his philosophy and approach into the here and now. I cannot recommend this book enough if you are looking for answers to questions about sustainability and how we get there from here! Buy it. Read it.

These pictures are from the Doxford Engine Works, taken between 1957 and 1958. WIlliam Doxford & Sons was an English shipbuilder going back as far as the later part of the 19th century. The factory floor is massive and seemingly either green or brown. Not to mention that with so many men milling about (literally), somewhat unfamiliar to our modern sensibility.