This paper reports on the practical application of a recently developed design tool, Shame Cues, which is a card deck created to help designers understand, reflect upon, and discuss social concepts related to shame and other self-conscious emotions. It consists of 64 cards divided into 16 categories, explaining how shame manifests itself in society and through concepts such as awkwardness, guilty pleasures, euphemisms and taboos. The tool has been tested in various workshops and for different contexts, mainly concerning social challenges focusing on stigma and taboos. Changing the focus toward sustainability, this paper reports on applying Shame Cues in the context of waste disposal and littering. While Design for Sustainable Behaviour provides a rich repertoire of design strategies to stimulate sustainable practices, scrutinizing the user research that has informed these littering cases reveals that aspects of shame, guilt, and hedonistic motivations have received limited attention. Addressing sustainable behaviour through a “shame lens” may lead to different insights about the suitability of Design for Sustainable Behaviour strategies and open for more empathic approaches rather than forceful ones. For this case study, the tool was made available to professional designers and design researchers without prior focused attention on shame as part of user research. The workshop was recorded and analysed, and the results were jointly discussed. This allowed for conclusions on two levels, considering both theme and method. Firstly, how can using the shame perspective inform the design process and expand the solution space in the context of littering? Secondly, what is the learning potential for designers when encouraged to look through a “shame lens”, in comparison to the default situation of applying design for sustainable behaviour strategies in which shame does not play an explicit role?