Liz K on Tour: To London and Back, a Sustainability Audit

Liz Knowles

In our first efforts to document some of our experiences on the road, collect our current knowledge about more sustainable practices, and express our broader interests as ‘artists who tour and want to be more sustainable’, I took on the topic of ‘How to Navigate an Airport more Sustainably’. I thought, ‘Wow, this is going to be easy!’ I mean, I do this A LOT and I know lots of airports and what they have to offer—as well as what they can’t provide—on a number of fronts like ‘good coffee’, ‘healthy food’, etc. And I am already a conscientious person and surely I have a lot to offer on this topic. Yeah, about that…..

As I began to write, I learned three things: 

  1. Embarrassingly, there are at least two habits I have that I can change and haven’t as of yet.

  2. I clearly know VERY LITTLE. 

  3. Documenting this trip brought up SO many more questions and concerns than I thought possible. A little attention paid opened up a sustainability-consciousness wormhole!

So, I decided to document exactly what I experienced on my trip to London in real time, with all of my comments, bumbles, missteps, and enlightening new discoveries. First and foremost, it is an earnest and honest audit of myself and the choices I made on this particular trip, but it also reveals the challenges to a touring artist when certain aspects are out of our control or the choices are limited. So come along on tour with me!

Click here to view the trip audit!