Biomimicry: Not Just Sharkskins and Honeycombs
In our series of guest blogs by speakers and supporters of our up-coming Workplace Trends Autumn Conference in London: People, Place, Performance, conference manager Maggie Procopi discusses biomimicry and biophilia, which have been engaging topics of discussion at recent conferences.
Over recent years at our Workplace Trends Conferences we’ve been lucky enough to welcome Michael Pawlyn and later Richard James MacCowan to speak on biomimicry, as well as Bill Browning and Oliver Heath on biophilia.
They enthralled audiences with tales of how the natural world can solve human problems through design solutions (biomimicry) and by satisfying our innate need to connect with nature (biophilia).
But biomimicry is more than just the famous design solutions we hear about, like the stability, aesthetics and economies of the Eden Project’s bubble raft shapes, or Sharklet Technologies printing sharkskin patterns onto adhesive film, which repels bacteria and so is ideal for installation in schools and hospitals, or harvesting water in the desert like the Stenocara Beetle.
Biomimicry casts its net wider than just design. The human race has only been here a fraction of the time that nature has. We can look to the wild world for tips and best practice on people management and leadership. Just Google and learn – from how a wolf pack works to the way a beehive operates and ant colonies manage themselves.
Most interestingly for the workplace is that nature never throws anything away, unlike our largely linear economy (make, use, dispose).
In a 2010 TED talk, ‘Using Nature’s Genius in Architecture’, Michael Pawlyn illustrated a ‘close-looped system’ (circular economy) with the ‘Cardboard to Caviar Project’. Put simply, restaurant waste was turned into horse bedding, then fed to worms, which were fed to fish, whose caviar was then served at the same restaurant. Nothing is wasted, and the whole process is economically and environmentally profitable.
Over the past 10 years, PwC has systematically applied the principles of the Circular Economy to its business. I’m especially delighted that Bridget Jackson from PwC will be sharing their experiences at our up-coming conference on 17 October 2018. It’s a story that has inspired BITC to create a Circular Office programme, with c. 75 companies now signed up to follow suit.
So as well as pondering the FM budget sheet, we need to take a hard look at the contents of our bins at home and work. What things need never be in existence at all (over-packaging, I cry!), what might be reused, what might be properly recycled?
Post by Maggie Procopi, event manager of the Workplace Trends and Design & Management of Learning Environments Conferences.
This article was originally published at FM World.