The MFA Industrial Design Global Studio at The New School / Parsons School of Design is a rigorous class led by adjunct professor and curriculum designer Shaun Fynn with part-time lecturer Zac Feltoon. As the course advisor and collaborator, I integrate Lot21’s climate action framework to inform and guide students’ research and creative thinking toward their decarbonization designs.

From the Outset

As with most challenging assignments, understanding context is everything at the outset.
Fortunately, there are well-established contextual frameworks to guide our thinking today. We utilize the widely recognized UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to provide a broad background and common language. But our focus is on SDG 13, Climate Action, because our climate provides the conditions for sustaining all forms of life, and its restoration is essential to achieving the other SDGs.

Class of 2026

This year, Parsons ID faculty and Lot21 selected four graduate student projects to showcase from a range of innovative submissions. Each project stems from the student’s personal lived experience that could benefit from decarbonization. Their solutions originate from the West, Central, and Eastern regions of the U.S., as well as the Far East.

Compact passenger vehicles in Chennai, India, were reimagined to mobilize and decarbonize the ‘last mile’ of transport in outer NYC neighborhoods. Los Angeles wildfires inspired the creation of bio-based materials derived from the invasive species that both fuel and spread the fires; and this experience has already sparked a new business venture. A disastrous, extreme weather event in St. Louis led to conceiving a new building material made from the rubble of destroyed buildings, reflecting on the city’s brickmaking and urban planning history. A neglected Brooklyn underpass was transformed into a low-carbon green space, revived with a modular, scalable system of 3D-printable planters — an open-source offering with global applicability.

It’s neither uncommon nor discouraged in this course to develop concepts that need or envision new technologies before they can be commercialized. But the four selected projects could be easily commercialized today because the materials and manufacturing processes already exist. What’s more, these projects illuminate what’s possible when a deeper understanding of climate impact bonds with personal experience to inform design and real-world applications.

In its entirety, the class of 2026 produced a wide range of creative outcomes, from biodegradable products coupled with provocative storylines to low-carbon materials with applications in the built environment. These four selected projects are published in Academia, our newest category, which you can learn about in How To Participate below.

The Underlying Structure

While SDG goals define what you aim to achieve, how you go about achieving them can differ. To guide the design process, we rely on the three pillars of climate action: climate resilience, emissions reduction, and carbon removal, briefly described below. Together, this framework provides a clear, science-based structure: the 17 SDGs present a broad perspective, while SDG 13 – Climate Action – acts as the central focus. Within SDG 13, the three climate action pillars inform, support, and shape the solutions. In this course, we show exemplary works from around the world that illustrate these pillars in action, helping students better understand how to apply a climate action lens to their own ideas and projects.

Tackle climate change and
its impacts through education, innovation, and adherence to your climate commitments

Resilience employs more adaptive solutions that can withstand the harmful effects
of climate change

Reduction lowers the carbon-emitting sources in the built environment, accelerating the pace of climate change

Removal captures excess planet-warming CO₂ in the atmosphere to restore our climate to safe pre-industrial conditions

Our Forever Work

Inevitably, every new generation will need the skills to design for decarbonization — because this restorative future is needed for all of us and the planet to thrive.
It’s an inseparable relationship.

When our climate literacy deepens, our design decisions become better informed. And then each generation becomes more prepared than the one before it.
This is our forever work — for many practitioners and people now, and even more participants moving forward.

With you, we can do a lot more!

Lew Epstein

Founder / CEO

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How To Participate

Leading academic institutions like Parsons School of Design are participating with Lot21 through their MFA Industrial Design Global Studio course. And, we’re excited to be returning for a third year this coming fall.

Academia, launched last year on Lot21, showcases the next generation of talent preparing to design for decarbonization. We welcome other leading academic programs to participate with us on Lot21, where we proudly present graduate-level projects to peers and prospective employers.

You’re always invited to participate by joining our Talks and Webinars, or by joining a Collab we’re developing that will be available later this year.

And if you’re interested in advancing climate action, please visit our Archives, where you’ll find free QUARTERLY newsletters with further guidance on how to participate. Be sure to see our Reading & Listening Suggestions at the end of each newsletter to make it easier to stay informed.