The Plenitude: Creativity, Innovation, and Making Stuff
We live with a lot of stuff. The average kitchen, for example, is home to stuff galore, and every appliance, every utensil, every thing, is compound—composed of tens, hundreds,even thousands of other things. Although each piece of stuff satisfies some desire, it also creates the need for even more stuff: cereal demands a spoon; a television demands a remote. Rich Gold calls this dense, knotted ecology of human-made stuff "the Plenitude." And in this book—at once cartoon treatise,...
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Lessons from the creative professions of and for art, science, design, and engineering: how to live in and with the Plenitude, that dense, knotted ecology of human-made stuff that creates the need for more of itself. Publishers Weekly Smart and ambitious, cosmopolite journalist Snyder maps the global garment industry, beginning in a New York loft where designers plot a line of ultra-pricy, socially responsible jeans that would ensure a fair wage for workers and not cause excessive environmental degradation. From there she visits cotton growers in Azerbaijan, denim specialists in Italy and factories in Cambodia and China. An excellent reporter, Snyder talks comfortably to both sophisticated designers and factory workers, conveying their very different motives as she paints a picture of an industry far more tangled than most consumers imagine. She notes that economic and employment shifts are felt globally, describing Italy mourning the loss of manufacturing to cheaper factories in Asia, where low-paying jobs represent unprecedented opportunity to many workers. If the prose occasionally verges on cuteness, it's preferable to the jargon of quotas and NGOs ubiquitous in most discussions of global trade. Snyder's investigation is an essential read for those curious about fashion or the globe-spanning business that produces their clothes. (Dec.)Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information
\ From the Publisher"This little book, with its simple logic and language and unforgettable, whimsical drawings, will change the way its readers look at the world around them." Susan Salter Reynolds LA Times\ \ \ \ \ Publishers WeeklySmart and ambitious, cosmopolite journalist Snyder maps the global garment industry, beginning in a New York loft where designers plot a line of ultra-pricy, socially responsible jeans that would ensure a fair wage for workers and not cause excessive environmental degradation. From there she visits cotton growers in Azerbaijan, denim specialists in Italy and factories in Cambodia and China. An excellent reporter, Snyder talks comfortably to both sophisticated designers and factory workers, conveying their very different motives as she paints a picture of an industry far more tangled than most consumers imagine. She notes that economic and employment shifts are felt globally, describing Italy mourning the loss of manufacturing to cheaper factories in Asia, where low-paying jobs represent unprecedented opportunity to many workers. If the prose occasionally verges on cuteness, it's preferable to the jargon of quotas and NGOs ubiquitous in most discussions of global trade. Snyder's investigation is an essential read for those curious about fashion or the globe-spanning business that produces their clothes. (Dec.)\ Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information\ \
