ZLI’s Sustainable Design Department

The ZLI Sustainable Design Department is where ZLI seeks to walk the walk, proactively applying the results of the PhotoSciences Department. Natural light is crucial for all living things on the planet. Natural light is necessary for health and well-being. The ZLI Design Department operates in recognition of this natural delicacy, seeking to conserve natural luminous environments and reducing the ecological risks and impacts associated with the aggressive artificial lighting practices of the past.

Fashion, Product and Architectural Design will be sustainable only when they discover and promotes viable ways of living life on the planet under largely natural lighting conditions. ZLI Sustainable Design Department seeks to discover and promote better ways of living within a more natural luminous environment on earth, because animals will not exist without access to the natural lighting conditions that shaped them. And if animals do not exist, neither will people.

The ZLI Sustainable Design Department has four related components:

Land Conservancy

Areas and Properties set aside for wildlife sensitive development or advocacy purposes, including ZLI PhotoDiversity Centers to sustain wildlife sensitive development and build community.

Sustainable Fashion Design

Sustainable Haute Couture Fashion dedicated to exploring the physical realities of natural light in the environment, night and day.

Products/Toys

Products that invite exploration, that emphasize the role of natural light and its importance.

Architecture/Light Design

As a Non-profit Design Service, the ZLI Sustainable Design Department pursues exhibit design in aquariums, science museums and zoos, projects of importance for specific wildlife populations to be featured in  PhotoDiversity Films, as well as high value projects for communities in the general landscape. Through our Save a Billion Birds™ Campaign, the ZLI Sustainable Design Department also offers consultations related to mitigate bird-collisions with glass in the built environment.