By Søren Mølgaard & Susanne Togeby AAU Communication and Public Affairs
Photo: Private

Sustainability has long been a central concept in relation to climate and resources. But according to Freja Kanstrup, a student in Sustainable Design at Aalborg University, the word is starting to lose its meaning.

“Today the word is used so broadly that it risks losing its power. When we call everything from shampoo to coffee cups sustainable - often without any real documentation - we’re no longer able to distinguish between what truly makes a difference and what is simply a good story,” she writes in an opinion piece on LinkedIn, which has also been published in the media "Ingeniøren".

The realization that we need a new concept came to Freja Kanstrup during a startup programme at AAU Innovate. As an entrepreneur in the company Second Life Label, she aims to create corporate clothing and merchandise by collecting unused or recycled shirts with company logos. These are redesigned, and new logos are printed on top. In this process, she has been out speaking with a number of different companies.

“It is in these dialogues that I have become painfully aware that the language we use and are taught on the Sustainable Design programme is far from common knowledge. It was during a dialogue with a sustainability committee from a large company that I realized the concept of ‘sustainability’ is no longer enough. It doesn’t cover what a company like mine actually does, when we can call anything sustainable.”

This prompted Freja Kanstrup to start writing. She wanted to find another term that better captures the idea that it is not enough to preserve. We must also use the resources we already have much more wisely. In other words, a concept that embraces the circular design mindset her company is built on. That term became future-worthiness. The word implies that we must improve and restore with a focus on the future.

Example of a future-worthy mindset

According to Freja Kanstrup, a future-worthy mindset means that we should reuse before we buy new, and repair and redesign so that the lifespan of products is extended. Only when all existing possibilities are exhausted should new production be considered. Here, we must use pure materials without chemical blends and design products so the materials can be recycled.

As an example, Freja Kanstrup mentions that a future-worthy T-shirt should be designed without mixed fibres so that it can be disassembled and spun into new fibres that can become new T-shirts.

The concept of sustainability has served us well, Freja Kanstrup points out, but she believes that its understanding needs to be broadened and updated to also encompass the future-worthy. This way, we can have a shared framework that covers environmental, economic, and social aspects as a whole system. And it should not be reserved for specialists or researchers, but used across experts, companies, and consumers.

Translated by: Daniel Thøgersen Balle, AAU Communication and Public Affairs