Designing sustainable furniture: guidelines to promote furniture Life Cycle Design

Given the serious environmental impact of the furniture system, the role of design in innovating furniture products toward sustainability is increasingly recognized as a key leverage, as acknowledged by the European Union’s Circular Economy Action Plan in 2020. The need for sustainable design knowledge to address environmental issues caused by the life cycle of furniture products – a fundamental part of the furniture system – has now been prioritized. Despite the fact that Life Cycle Design (LCD) is widely studied as a systematic approach that considers all life cycle stages and engages the objectives of reducing environmental impacts, its application within the furniture system is still very limited. Within this framework, the paper presents furniture-specific LCD guidelines to guide sustainable furniture design. These guidelines were developed through an established methodology involving scholars and specialists on both Design for Sustainability and Furniture Design, and were the results of a research project funded by the Italian Ministry of Education (MIUR), aimed at developing and disseminating innovative design strategies and guidelines to foster a sustainable and circular economy within the furniture industry. In this sense, these guidelines will promote long-term open innovation and technological transformation of furniture products, allowing designers and organizations to support the implementation of sustainable options from the beginning of the design process.