March 31, 2008 - With more products boasting green credentials, many designers are downplaying the environmental aspect in favor of good old-fashioned performance, Design Week reports.

Thanks to "green fatigue," consumers have gone back to choosing products based on product efficiency or personal taste, according to Andy Hill, managing director of personal-care products maker KMI. The company's new Patently Obvious line of eco-friendly liquid soaps, while packaged in recycled plastic, are designed for a sleek, modern look.

The decision was deliberate, according to Hill. "Too much that is green asks for compromise on quality. Fatigue is an issue because so many eco products don't work - but green doesn't mean lowering the bar. We wanted 'bath-edge brilliance' for our bottles - something people want to show off. The first principle in product design should be functionality - not making it look like recycled flip-flops."

Ben Tomlinson, creative director at design consultancy ICO design, agrees. "Recycled paper used to look recycled, but now it's not so in your face," he says. "Brands don't have to shout, because they should be doing it anyway - products should actually be green, not just look green."

John Thackara, program director of the U.K's 2007 Designs of the Time festival, suggests that growing consumer awareness of green issues is forcing product designers to move in a new direction. "People are becoming expert at working out if a product has actually changed," he says. "Among designers, there was the "lets-make-a-poster-about-it [a brand's eco-credentials]" school of thought, but that is now giving way to a new group of people, sustainable designers, who are interested in re-engineering processes for the future."

Expect products to become more sustainable even as fewer brands use packaging to draw attention to their green attributes, says Luke Vincent of Dragon Branding. "Green benefits should be embedded, so the issue of sustainability disappears and effectively becomes the norm."