Full Circle: Designing a Sustainable Future

Our free, do-it-yourself exhibition showcases the power of design to build a sustainable future, featuring inspiring examples of buildings, systems, and objects created to restore and regenerate the Earth’s ecosystems.

Download, print, and display in your school, community center, library, or cultural organization—or explore online.

Exhibition materials are appropriate for 6th grade and above and includes 17 projects across various disciplines.

About the Exhibition

Our planet is at a critical crossroads. Since the Industrial Age, human activity has pushed ecosystems to their breaking point—draining natural resources, polluting water, degrading soil, and filling the air with harmful toxins. This unchecked exploitation has also wreaked havoc on our climate.

But there is hope. The answer lies in regenerative design—an approach that restores, strengthens, and heals the planet rather than depleting it. Imagine buildings, products, and systems that not only meet human needs but also replenish and revitalize the environment. That’s the promise of regenerative design.

MODA’s DIY exhibition, Full Circle: Designing a Sustainable Future, spotlights the groundbreaking work of designers leading this movement. From transformative architectural projects redefining sustainability to innovative products reducing waste, this exhibition demonstrates the immense potential of design to drive meaningful, positive change.

Ready to inspire your school or community? Hosting Full Circle is an opportunity to spark important conversations and ignite action for a better, more sustainable world—all beginning with the power of design!

Suggested Audience

Appropriate for audiences ages 8+.

Accompanying Materials

For Schools: MODA also offers lesson plans that allow schools and educational organizations to strengthen student learning about the content of Full Circle and suggested resources related to each project in the exhibition, such as books, videos, and films.

For General Visitors: The hands-on activities and discussions included in the curriculum packet are as appropriate for adults as for youth. Additionally, website pages dedicated to each of the projects featured in the exhibition provides recommended books, videos, movies and articles that expand learning. Just click through each project to access those materials.

Become an Exhibition Host!

Hosting MODA's DIY exhibition, Full Circle: Designing a Sustainable Future, is simple, engaging, and impactful! Here’s a step-by-step guide to get you started:

  1. Download the Exhibition Kit: First, complete the form requesting the exhibition materials. MODA will review your request and then send access to a kit with 17 poster files, lesson plans, and hands-on activities suitable for 6th grade and above students.

  2. Print and Prepare: Print the posters and any additional materials. The files are designed for easy printing; you can print them in different sizes to fit your space. You can print them in-house with a good-quality printer, work with a local print shop, or outsource them to a printer like Vistaprint.

  3. Select Your Space: Choose an area in your community center, library, school, or public space where people can engage with the exhibition. Make sure it's a location that gets good foot traffic so as many people as possible can learn from the materials.

  4. Set Up the Exhibition: Arrange the posters to encourage exploration. You can hang them on walls, set up a series of panels, or even use easels to create a path for visitors to follow. The key is to make it visually appealing and easy to navigate.

  5. Engage Your Audience: Use the lesson plans provided in the kit to organize workshops or guided discussions. These activities are perfect for classrooms, youth groups, or general visitors who want to learn more about sustainable design. The lesson plans include hands-on projects that allow participants to think like designers and create solutions for a sustainable future.

  6. Promote Your Exhibition: Let your community know about the exhibition! You can use social media, email newsletters, or community bulletin boards to spread the word. Make it an event—consider hosting an opening day activity to draw in visitors and spark conversation.

  7. Get Creative: Feel free to add your touch to the exhibition! You can include local examples of sustainable design, invite a guest speaker, or add a Q&A wall where people can leave thoughts and questions.

  8. Share Your Experience: MODA loves to see how Full Circle is making an impact! Take photos, share on social media, and tag MODA. You’ll join a network of changemakers using design to build a better world.

If you have any questions or need additional support, MODA is here to help! Email info@museumofdesign.org

This project was realized with the generous support of

FAQs

Have a question? Browse our FAQs. If you don’t find an answer, reach out to us at info@museumofdesign.org.

  • The Museum of Design Atlanta, commonly known as MODA, considers design as a creative approach that can solve complex problems and transform the world.

    MODA offers a variety of exhibitions, educational programs, and events that showcase design in many forms, including architecture, industrial design, interior design, furniture design, fashion, and graphic design. These programs encourage people to consider how design impacts their daily lives and the broader world.

  • The Full Circle poster exhibition includes design files to print 17 posters and 1 introductory poster.

    The posters are sized at 27” x 40” and can be printed on the material of your choice.

    We also provide an educators’ guide with curriculum and design challenges for grades 6-12.

    The webpage for each project featured in the exhibition includes resources for learning more. QR codes on each poster lead to the webpage so that these resources are readily available to all who see the posters.

  • Libraries, schools, community centers, museums, and other organizations are invited to download and print the Full Circle posters and display them in a public space.

    You can also download an educators’ guide for grades 6-12.

    We ask that those interested in bringing this exhibition to their community complete this short form. We’ll reply with further details!

  • This DIY exhibition—available for free—is designed to be easily installed in any type of location, such as schools, offices, community centers, libraries, coffee shops, hospitals, transit hubs, museums, and science centers.

    The exhibition can be a companion to existing museum exhibitions, or an addition to meeting spaces, science fairs, classroom activities, and conferences.

  • There are several ways to display the posters.

    The simplest is to print them and put them up with thumbtacks.

    More elegant (but more expensive) solutions include framing the posters or having them mounted to a substrate like foam core, gator board, or cintra. If you don’t know about these materials, printers will be able to give you advice and some online printers like Vistaprint offer one or more of these options.

  • Your organization or venue will be provided with files to produce the 19 pre-designed exhibit panels.

    While each venue can determine which exhibit panels to include, all installations must include the title panel acknowledging MODA, The Kendeda Fund, and providing an introduction to the exhibit.

  • Regenerative design is a way of creating buildings, landscapes, systems, and objects that restore, revitalize, and improve natural ecosystems.

    The concept is grounded in the understanding that human activities have caused significant degradation to the Earth's ecosystems, leading to issues like climate change, loss of biodiversity, and depletion of resources. Regenerative design seeks to reverse this trend by creating systems, structures, and technologies that repair the damage and contribute positively to the environment.

  • Once we have received your form asking for the exhibition, we provide access to a Google folder with ready-to-print PDFs.

    All printing costs are the sole responsibility of the venue.

  • As of fall 2023, we estimate that each poster will cost approximately $35 to print. We’ve been using Vistaprint to print them, but any reputable printer should be able to print the posters.

    If you have access to a large format printer, it can be used to print the posters.

  • Absolutely! Learn more about the Full Circle curriculum.

  • This exhibition was made possible through the generous support of The Kendeda Fund.

    It was curated and designed by MODA staff including Veronica Klucik, Laura Flusche, Judith Rios, Susan Sanders, and Mary Kelly.

    The educational curriculum and design challenges were created by Earline Johnson.

  • Please reach out to info@museumofdesign.org.