Man-Made

A Next Big Idea Club Must-Read "A powerful and urgent call to action—for the health and safety of half of our population, it’s time we rethink the male body ideal and build a world that includes us all.” —Dr. Elizabeth Comen, MD, medical oncologist, associate professor of medicine at NYU Langone, and bestselling author of All in Her Head “This book challenges us to ask new questions and, more important, to question old answers.” —John Hoke III, chairman of the board of MillerKnoll and former chief innovation– officer of Nike, Inc. An industrial er and former Global Creative Director at Nike delivers a sharp critique of the consequences of a world built by and for men, and offers an optimistic look at how we might build a better world for us all. Women and men inhabit the same world, yet it does not suit them both equally. Women are 73% more likely to be injured in a car crash than men. In the military, women suffer pelvic fractures at a much higher rate than their male counterparts. In construction, 90% of women are unable to find proper fitting safety gear. These outcomes are not a coincidence—they are a result of products where the female population is an afterthought at best. Automobile crash test dummies used for safety tests are ed based on male anatomy, as is firefighting gear and personal protective equipment. Using a “shrink it and pink it” strategy, sneakers for women are scaled down versions originally ed for a man’s foot, and colored a stereotypical feminine color – like pink. In the of products and places, the female body is often invisible and ignored. The result is a world less hospitable and more dangerous for women. It doesn’t have to be this way. A er for over 40 years at some of the world’s top corporations, including Reebok and Nike, Karen Korellis Reuther has witnessed the way women continue to be excluded from critical product decisions. But Man-Made, isn’t a patriarchal lament; it is a rousing call to action drawn from research-backed insights, market analyses, and expertise from leading ers, executives, and economists. From the simply insulting and uncomfortable to the dangerous and deadly, the effects of exclusively man-made s are wide-ranging. Rethinking and expanding product and architecture, Reuther contends, will not only create a world that better fits women, but a world that better fits everyone.