The big idea is that by informing the public in compelling ocular ways, a message can resonate and the recipients of that message will feel motivated to act. Examples of successful models fill the pages of the book in a tremendous stream of inventive calls to action. Divided into loosely defined chapters, the book demonstrates how design, color, humor, and the element of surprise can serve as tools in the art of sustainability communication. We see how it’s possible to entertain as well as enlighten.

A non-profit like Hamburg, Germany’s “Plant-for-the-Planet” may not have the PR resources of a timber harvesting multinational. To promote its ambitious mission of planting a billion trees worldwide, the organization had to think outside the box and developed a series of ads showing leaf carvings that depict sources of pollution. Borrowing from the technique of the Spanish artist Lorenzo Durán, it’s a prime illustration of how smart design can provoke an emotional response in a way that raw data often fails to do. In a similar fashion, attention-grabbing ads and posters have been commissioned by other sustainability-minded organizations in the hope of getting through to those who encounter them with subjects including the hunting of threatened species and the food mileage attached to much of the produce we eat.