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Meet Lucy von Sturmer. As the initiator and director of Creatives for Climate, she knows all about the language of change. Lucy's on a mission to rescale one million creatives, equipping them with the tools needed to make a difference.

Creatives for Climate is a global collective of 30.000 creatives driving climate action at work. They are driven by the common purpose to combat greenwashing and promote positive climate action. Since 2019, they have developed and executed over 10 campaigns in support of climate organizations — generating thousands of creative assets and capturing millions of eyes across international press (image: Creatives for Climate)→

Creatives for Climate teamed up with Greenpeace to launch a creative call to action that would help ban fossil fuel advertising in Europe. The goal was to provide the European Commission with 1 million signatures, the minimum needed to legally require their response. Over 100 creatives from the community got together to generate a gallery full of action-driven posters, all within one week (image: Creatives for Climate)→

Lucy is the founder of The Humblebrag, an award-winning impact communications consultancy with a firm commitment to business as a force for good. Discover her philosophy in the 1-minute video ‘Gain the courage to stand for change’ (image: The Humblebrag) →

One of the actions by Creatives for Climate was done in partnership with For the Love of Bees, an organization run by Lucy’s mother Sarah Smuts-Kennedy. Through the generation of banners, posters, and other creative assets, the community helped overturn Auckland City Council’s decision to use Glyphosate across New Zealand’s largest city as a weed killer (image: Creatives for Climate) →

In 2023, Harald met the team behind Refugio Bees at What Design Can Do. Their goal is to use design as a tool for supporting local biodiversity, and to make cities more hospitable to native bees that are under threat of extinction. Discover their modular bee shelters (image: Refugio Bees) →

In 2017, Mount Taranaki in New Zealand was granted the same legal rights as a person. Eight local Māori tribes and the government now share guardianship of the sacred mountain on the North Island, in a long-awaited acknowledgement of the indigenous people’s relationship to the mountain, who view it as an ancestor and whanau, or family member. More on The Guardian (image: Ganjaa/GoodFon.com) →

When Lucy first came to the Netherlands, she ran communications for HIVOS, a major multi-stakeholder initiative in sustainability. “ It felt like I was paid to go to university. Read this academic paper and write about it. Confront your own notions of privilege and progress.” Explore 50 years of HIVOS campaigns through poster graphics (image: HIVOS) →

Lucy is a former communications lead of the Zero Discharge of Hazardous Chemical Programme (ZDHC), which leads efforts to eliminate toxic chemicals from the global clothing supply chain. Many leading brands — including Asos, Decathlon and G-Star — have joined the initiative and the list keeps growing. Explore the movement on Forbes (Image: toxic tannery in Bangladesh, photographed by Larry C. Price) →

Creatives for Climate created the greenwash swatch, a toolkit for “shades” of greenwashing. The swatch identifies an increasingly complex greenwashing landscape — including new trends such as greencrowding, greenrinsing, and greenshifting. The tool was launched at Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity 2023, where secret agents descended onto the promenade to hand out swatches and empower attendees to identify examples of greenwashing (image: Creatives for Climate) →

Lucy: “In 2019, Extinction Rebellion issued this direct call to arms to the advertising industry: you are the myth makers of society and you are directly responsible for the hyperconsumption that we have. No, your pro bono CSR campaign of plastic straws isn't going to cut it. I often refer to it because it's still exactly the reason that we do Creatives for Climate today” Read the book for free on Google Books (image: Extinction Rebellion) →

Extinction Rebellion has seen an unprecedented level of planning with its protest graphics. The movement has an in-house art group, made up of graphic, fashion and stage designers and artists. All pre-made materials are available to download for free on Extinction Rebellion’s website. Graphic designer Clive Russell, who was the lead on the art group’s protest graphics project, explains to DesignWeek how this works in practice (image: Extinction Rebellion) →

Momkai, the design agency behind this podcast, is a founding member of ‘Fossiel? No Deal!’ — a movement from the Netherlands that says no to creative work for the fossil industry. Join more than 50 agencies in the movement (image: Fossiel? No Deal!) →

In March 2024, Harald co-founded The School for Moral Ambition with historian Rutger Bregman. The School gives words to something we've always been passionate about at Momkai and at Memberful Design. The movement, dedicated towards careers with impact, comes from the will to make the world a wildly better place. Learn how we kickstart a global movement and join us here (image: Momkai/School for Moral Ambition) →

Discover the largest open source recycling project in the world, founded by Dave Hakkens. Precious Plastic is a participatory design community that fights plastic waste with over 500 stations of recycling made in more than 100 countries around the world — from Australia to Sri Lanka (image: Precious Plastic) →

The Berkana Two-Loops Model is a perfect example of how we can start to visualize systems change. Lucy: “You have essentially one system that needs to die, and then you have another system that is emerging. It’s awesome because it's helping me think about the spectrum of change making. Where is my work most relevant?” (image: The Moment) →

Stay sane, stay safe is another great example of distributed creativity, initiated by The Hague-based studio Lennarts & De Bruijn during the COVID pandemic. Their poster platform attracted over 1,800 uplifting coronavirus posters from designers around the world. The aim was "to support lifesavers and to inspire home-stayers" in times of Covid-19. Anyone was allowed to download, print and share them, helping to spread positive (and often funny) messages to get people around the world through lockdown (photograph by Joost van Asch) →

There’s a growing trend of Repair Cafes spreading across Europe. These are repair shops in local communities where people are fixing gadgets, clothing and more – often for free. These cafes don’t just point to a rise in sustainability efforts, they represent the convergence of distributed creativity for good. Volunteers at these cafes share skills, stories and a sense of purpose, moving beyond transactions and towards connection. More on The Guardian (image: M. Luggen) →

The book Ministry for the Future, by Kim Stanley Robinson, offers a compelling narrative that challenges readers to confront pressing global issues through a lens of speculative fiction. By vividly portraying a world dealing with the consequences of climate change, the novel urges readers to think about the significance of collective action and systemic change. It shows us how important it is to take action and adjust our narratives, inspiring readers to envision meaningful pathways towards a brighter future (image: Orbit Books) →

Alex Vuocolo on the value of maintenance: “Maintenance is different from repair and it’s chronically undervalued. Repair is when you fix something that’s already broken. Maintenance is about making something last.” Highly recommended article on NOEMA (illustration by Scott Balmer) →

Explore the groundbreaking winners of the Make It Circular challenge by our friends at What Design Can Do — from landless food to kelp-based packaging. From Lucy: “Really, if you can't repair it or you can't make it circular, maybe you shouldn't make it, right? That's the license to operate.” (image: WDCD) →

Designing for planetary health is a pivotal step towards positive change. On the next episode of Memberful Design, urbanist and strategist Sarah Ichioka talks about the importance of community-centric design in transforming cities for the better. Stay tuned for an inspiring conversation with Harald next week (image: © kelly hill photography).

Many cities around the world aren’t meeting the most basic needs of their citizens. At the same time, urban areas have become the biggest driver of the climate crisis. The Ideal City by SPACE10 and gestalten explores how to create a better everyday life in our cities. As part of their research, they visited 53 cities in 30 countries, speaking with radical thinkers from architecture, design, technology, and governance. Discover the book (illustration: Manshen Lo) →

Amsterdam is known as the cycling capital of the world, but that wasn’t inevitable. In fact, in the 1960s and 70s, it looked like we would follow the same path as the United States. The Dutch had fallen in love with cars and they were rebuilding their cities to make room for them. It was only because of a multi-decade pro-cycling movement that cars didn’t take over the country entirely. Discover the story on 99% Invisible (image: City of Amsterdam) →

The Creatives for Climate toolkit is designed with everyone in mind to help you use your creativity to create a positive impact. Packed with actionable insights, learning resources, videos, courses and tools, it’s the ultimate guide to supercharging your climate action journey. Download the toolkit for free and discover how you can get involved in positive change (image: Creatives for Climate) →

Join the Creatives for Climate community or take one of their courses to eliminate greenwashing from your work and change the creative industry for the better (image: The Humblebrag) →