Just inside the entrance to the National Design Triennial, at the Smithsonian's Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum in New York, sits the Solvatten, a shiny, black rectangular plastic container resembling an ordinary gasoline canister. Your first reaction upon seeing it might be to wonder why it's sitting inside a design museum; however, the nondescript package masks world-changing functionality. When the container is set out in the sun, it purifies water — no energy required.

After past shows celebrating futuristic forms, translucent plastic, and high-tech gizmos, all designed largely to fuel consumer lust, this year's triennial has decidedly different ambitions. Named Why Design Now?, it even questions the very purpose of design. Is its role in contemporary society to sculpt a more stylish toothbrush, or to do something more meaningful? Judging by the 134 projects on display, from a lamp powered by soil to a speedy condom applicator that aims to reduce the spread of HIV in South Africa, it's clear the Cooper-Hewitt's curators have decided on the latter.

But it's not just the curators. The exhibition reflects a fundamental shift in the design industry. Traditionally, designers are the people who style the plastic water bottles, soon-to-be-obsolete electronic devices, and throwaway furnishings that clog our landfills, chew through resources, and help us exploit foreign workers. Now, however, influenced by images of suffering in developing countries, news about global warming, and disasters like the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, they're suddenly feeling guilty. On their own time, they've begun identifying social and environmental problems, and looking for solutions. Call it the new designer conscience.

"I think designers are finally understanding the real impact they can have, both negative and positive, in various parts of the world," says Matilda McQuaid, deputy curatorial director at the Cooper-Hewitt. In addition to the work they do for corporate clients, "There's an understanding that they also have a responsibility to the public," she says.

The challenge for designers will be to balance their altruistic desires with their traditional role of responding to consumer demand for drool-worthy products. Those considerations aren't mutually exclusive — the Bauhaus school of the early twentieth century, and mid-century modern designers like Charles and Ray Eames, believed design could affect social change and improve living conditions for ordinary people, yet they also succeeded in realizing objects that are still coveted as design classics. The task for today's designers will be to develop a new voice — to respond to twenty-first-century issues without losing their sense of joy.

(Source: Conscious Designs [Walrus])