William McDonough

Honor commerce as the engine of change.

— 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…

— William McDonough

You don't filter smokestacks or water. Instead, you put the filter in your head and design the problem out of existence.

— William McDonough

If design is the first signal of human intention.

— William McDonough

You need that same creative force that exists in a building like Disney [Walt Disney Concert Hall] to actually tackle that most…

— William McDonough

And to use something as elegant as a tree? Imagine this design assignment: Design something that makes oxygen, sequesters carbon, fixes nitrogen,…

— William McDonough

I'd so much rather have exciting architecture that causes one to stop, breathe, and reflect on the potential of the human mind,…

— William McDonough

To eliminate the concept of waste means to design things-products, packaging, and systems-from the very beginning on the understanding that waste does…

— William McDonough

We are not a green standard, we are a quality standard. We're different, we're multi dimensional.

— William McDonough

Don't get me wrong: I love nuclear energy! It's just that I prefer fusion to fission. And it just so happens that…

— William McDonough

If anybody here has trouble with the concept of design humility, reflect on this: It took us 5,000 years to put wheels…

— William McDonough

The problem I have with carbon as a bad thing issue, is that people go out and say they want to be…

— William McDonough

If you don't have an end game of something delightful, you're just moving chess pieces around.

— 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…

— William McDonough

I just think it is so delightful to see people, let their elbows free. I think the exuberance of it all is…

— William McDonough

Design is inherently optimistic. That is its power.

— William McDonough

I can't imagine something being beautiful at this point in history if it's destroying the planet or causing children to get sick.…

— William McDonough

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

— William McDonough

So when you see a regulation against lead, because lead is a bad in a regulators mind, what does that mean? You…

— William McDonough

If we think about things having multiple lives, cradle to cradle, we could design things that can go back to either nature…

— 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

“How do we love all children, of all species, FOR all time?” ― William McDonough”

— William McDonough

This idea that things are designed to go back to nature or industry for ever which is our articulation of these two…

— William McDonough

Imagine walking into a grocery there is a jar sitting there with a lid on it saying it's not carbon. That is…

— William McDonough

Design is the first signal of human intention.

— William McDonough