Design Indaba conference
Designing for social change was a theme that ran deep and featured early in this year's Design Indaba Conference. Some Sprouts attended the Young Designer's Simulcast - these were the social designers we were inspired by.

Francis Kéré
Francis Kéré, who received the first standing ovation at this year's conference, is a highly talented yet humble architect who comes from the small village of Gando in Burkina Faso (West Africa.) After being approached by the village community to save their school which was near collapse Kéré and friends founded the Schulbausteine für Gando (School bricks for Gando) association in 1999.

Infecting the city

Beginning Monday 21st, it's time for Spier's fourth Infecting The City. For those who are not familiar with it: never fear, whilst contagious it is not likely to be life threatening.

Infecting The City is Africa's only Public Arts Festival and it involves transforming the public spaces of Cape Town into wonderful works of art that will help us view the city from a different and often informative perspective.

This years theme, 'Treasure', is about appreciating the wonderful gifts that Cape Town has to offer: from the wonderful variety of cultures and historical buildings to the forgotten natural resources and seemingly useless waste...this years festival is definitely worth a wander.

We've picked out a couple of events, tours and installations with an eco-friendly angle and listed them below

This beautiful and huge 'nest' is a work of art by Land Art artist Jody Joyner from Tucson, Arizona. You can see it at Soekershof, just outside Robertson.

Inspired by the weaver birds' nests that run along the Klaas Voogds River through the gardens, the nest is made of woven hibiscus twigs...

As part of the HumanEarth exhibition showing at Wessel Snyman Creative, the group of young artists is putting on a performance art event on Thursday evening, 20 January, from 6pm.

The theme is human interaction with nature, the ways that we either harm or help the natural environment, and the exhibition as well as the event is aimed at promoting and initiating conversation and dialogue around this.

What you can expect to see:

6pm - see painters Thabiso Phepeng and Atang Tshikare in action

6.30pm - experience Danny Shorkend's work in sound, motion and action and find out how your futurre entertwines with that of the planet, with Janet Ranson's environmental art tarot cards

7pm - join for Land Art and poetry in an urban setting with Janet Botes

WHEN: Thursday 20 January
WHERE: Wessel Snyman Creative, 17 Bree Street, Cape Town

going green by simon gearIts nearly Christmas and many of us are thinking about gifts to buy. Well one book that I can wholeheartedly recommend is Going Green - 365 Ways to Change our World. This book is filled with great ideas on how to make our planet a better place. The book is written by Simon Gear, known as one of South Africa's favorite weathermen.

350 EARTH Dominican RepublicThe world's largest solar picnic is happening this Saturday 27 November so if you live in Cape Town come and be part of it!
350.org's eARTh, is the first ever art exhibit large enough to be seen from space. Fifteen large-scale human art formations will photographed by satellite and shared with the world on the eve of the next round of U.N. climate talks.

The EARTH project has already begun with images from Santa Fe (a flash flood), Los Angeles (solar eagle taking flight), and New York (school roof painting) in the US, from Spain (girls face), from the Dominican Republic (person standing on roof, escaping sea level rise), from Mexico (a hurricane) and from Canada (a green footprint). And Thom Yorke (radiohead) is behind the aerial art formation at Brighton (a recreation of King Canute)

Cape Town is one of only two locations in Africa and 15 in the world, so you can bet we're going to be there and make history!

Bill McKibben says that these

plastikos exhibition @ two oceans aquariumIn recognition of National Marine Month last month the Two Oceans Aquarium has created a stunning new exhibit at which visitors can discover creatures from the mythological floating island of waste called Plastikos. The exhibition is produced by Simon MAX Bannister, and is a unique exhibition that aims to raise awareness about waste - particularly plastic and micro plastic - and its impact on the oceans, through art. The works are made from reclaimed polyethylene plastic which MAX collected by hand from the shorelines, roadsides and landfills of South Africa. Plastikos will be on display in the Aquarium until the end of January 2011.

The exhibit is incorporated into the Atlantic Ocean Gallery of the Aquarium, Plastikos includes giant sculptures, a spectacular backlit plastic rendition of the Earth, as well as an

Cape Town is making a bid for the title of World Design Capital 2014, and Men About Town, Mokena Makeka & Rory Williams, are running a competition to explore new ideas for the city. Selected entries will be brought together in a book, and will be considered for inclusion in Cape Town’s World Design Capital 2014 bid book.

Your entry can be submitted in written or drawn form before the 1st of November and you will be eligible for a prize and your entry considered for inclusion in the handbook. Those who submit the top 3 ideas will each get R 2000, and the next four top ideas will each get R 1000.

The topics, themes, concepts and ideas you can submit, in visual or written form, are virtually limitless. They are hoping for a mix of completely wild and wacky on the one hand, and serious planning proposals on the other.

Yothu YindiHoney doesn't have a sound or does it? I'm not referring here to the buzzi-ness of bees either but to an album by Yothu Yindi which I've rediscovered in my CD collection and have been playing quite loudly and jumping up and down to this morning(sorry neighbours!). If you're into a fusion of didg and Australian rock (think Midnight Oil) with earth-centred lyrics this is a great band to check out. I'm enjoying their fourth CD - Birrkuta (Wild Honey) - thoroughly right now. The album has a few high energy rock tracks that get the blood pumping, some chilled out tunes and some traditional indigenous Australian arrangements. The lyrics are stirring with tracks like Spirit of Peace and Timor very moving. I've been reading the cover notes about the Yolngu's reverence for bees and the celebration of their heritage:

We hunt for wild honey at a particular time of year. There's always a group of us, women and children. It's a joyful thing for us. To outsiders it looks as though we're doing something very ordinary, but for us collecting honey is a way of paying homage to

The Biodiversity Showcase Garden at Cape Town's Green Point Urban Park was launched a couple of days ago and I went along to take a look at what has been taking shape beyond the fence. Calling it a garden is a bit of a misnomer as this doesn't quite convey the sense of what it is all about. This is not a space merely to observe pretty plants (you won't find any daffodils, hydrangeas or roses here!), rather in the botanical sense, it is a place to immerse yourself in our unique flora: you will leave here a changed person, inspired and ready to do your bit for furthering biodiversity.

This is a superbly landscaped biodiversity experience in the middle of an urban park. You are aware of being in the city: it is a fynbos-urban mashup with lots of interest to hold your attention. The setting is spectacular, being bounded by