MAINE INTERIOR DESIGN ASSOCIATION’S ZERO LANDFILL DAYS
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Jill Albers serves as the Secretary of the MIDA Board of Directors, and is an Account Executive for Interface, Inc. – ME, VT, NH.
within the spaces, as well as protect the sacred planet we live on.
Starting a career in any field is often a less straightforward path than it initially seems. When I entered design school, I didn’t have the slightest clue about all the different directions a design degree and the profession could take someone. The possibilities expanded greatly, however, when I saw a documentary about Interface’s founder, Ray Anderson, I knew immediately that my design career could give me a real purpose. He had just turned Interface upside down by creating a company mission to eliminate his publicly traded, global company’s negative impact on the environment by 2020, an ambitious goal that many believed was not possible. But to a design student, he was inspiring. His mission showed me the power of our profession to guide our clients to make sustainable choices for their projects, create healthy environments for the people
Sustainability became a guiding concept for me, and as I grew in my profession and drilled down into products to understand their impact, I appreciated Interface’s mission even more. Twelve years later, I moved my family to Maine and started working as the local Interface rep for Northern New England. I now get to spend my days talking about climate change, embodied carbon, carbon sequestering, and flooring (of course). Shortly after arriving in Maine, I joined the Maine Interior Design Association’s (MIDA) Board of Directors, and it’s been wonderful to be part of this design community and work together to further the profession
in the state. Inspired by an idea that arose when Interface started rethinking how things were done, I proposed a Zero-Landfill project, something that began when a rep in Ohio realized that designers often threw away leftover samples, so every Friday he drove to local
