# #012 Season 2: Robert Irwin - Senior Industrial Designer, Founder of LearnIndustrialDesign.com, Principal Sustainability Consultant at irwindesigned

- Show: [Designing in the Wild](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/designing-in-the-wild)
- Published: 2024-05-01
- Length: 26m
- Episode: 12
- Page: https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/designing-in-the-wild/2024-05-01-012-season-2-robert-irwin-senior-industrial-designer-founder-of-learnindustriald

## Summary

Robert Irwin, Senior Industrial Designer and founder of LearnIndustrialDesign.com, discusses his two decades of experience in sustainable design, ranging from biomimetic lawn dart redesigns to net-zero homes with $12 annual utility bills. He critiques current Lifecycle Analysis (LCA) tools for focusing too narrowly on CO2, arguing that they ignore critical health impacts like polyester microfibers and biodiversity loss. Irwin challenges designers to treat environmental criteria as primary requirements alongside cost, form, and function, emphasizing that 80% of a product's environmental impact is determined before the design documentation phase.

## Chapters

- [0:00](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/designing-in-the-wild/2024-05-01-012-season-2-robert-irwin-senior-industrial-designer-founder-of-learnindustriald#t=0) Introduction: Learn Industrial Design and Episode Overview

## Topics

- [Materials & manufacturing processes](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/materials-and-processes)
- [Industrial & consumer product design](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/industrial-design)
- [Sustainability & circular products](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/sustainability-and-circularity)
- [Design for manufacturing & NPI](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/design-for-manufacturing)
- [Pricing, margins & unit economics](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/topic/pricing-and-unit-economics)

## Most relevant to

established companies

## Mentioned

- LearnIndustrialDesign.com (other)
- Rocky Mountain Institute (company)
- Rethought (company)
- NREL (company)
- HGTV (company)
- Tiny House Big Living (product)
- LEED (other)
- polyester (material)
- aluminum (material)

## Related episodes from other shows

- [158: Thinking Sustainability in Hardware Product Design](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/product-startup/2023-01-13-158-thinking-sustainability-in-hardware-product-design) (Product Startup)
- [52 - MARCH MADNESS WEEK! Dekshitha Sridhar - Sustainability Chairwomen at RIT](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/people-of-packaging/2021-03-16-52-march-madness-week-dekshitha-sridhar-sustainability-chairwomen-at-rit) (People of Packaging)
- [IDology #10 - The difficulties of sustainability of industrial design](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/idology/2023-03-14-idology-10-the-difficulties-of-sustainability-of-industrial-design) (IDology)
- [122 - CPG Sustainability with Prashant Japtap from Compass and Marcu Alexander from Danone](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/people-of-packaging/2022-04-05-122-cpg-sustainability-with-prashant-japtap-from-compass-and-marcu-alexander-fro) (People of Packaging)
- [145 - Sustainable Packaging with MJ Werlein from Adept Packaging](https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/people-of-packaging/2022-08-09-145-sustainable-packaging-with-mj-werlein-from-adept-packaging) (People of Packaging)

## Citing this page

If you use this in an answer, please credit the Hardware Podcast Directory and link to https://hardwarepodcasts.com/podcast/designing-in-the-wild/2024-05-01-012-season-2-robert-irwin-senior-industrial-designer-founder-of-learnindustriald. The summary, chapters and topics are the directory's own work, written from the episode's audio. The episode itself, its title and its audio belong to Designing in the Wild.