Essentially, biomimicry involves mimicking the shapes, designs and strategies found in nature to solve human design challenges.
The videos, links and illustrations below provide a fun and interesting overview of what biomimicry is and how it has been used in the design of the products and places that surround us.
Biomimicry has three essential parts: Ethos, (Re)Connect, and Emulate and students will need to strive for all three as they complete the YDC and work toward their design solution.
Ethos refers to the aspirational goal of biomimicry. That is, understanding how life works and creating designs that continuously support and create conditions conducive to life (sustainability).
(Re)Connect acknowledges that humans are part of nature. Biomimicry finds value in connecting to our place on Earth as part of life’s interconnected systems, and encourages us to observe/ spend time in nature to better understand how life works.
Emulate refers to the scientific, research-based practice of learning from and then replicating nature’s forms, processes, and ecosystems to create increasingly regenerative designs. Biomimicry designers abstract terminology from biology to be used in design. During the design process of emulating an object’s form, process, or system, a biomimicry designer might need to translate what an organism can do into what an engineer might understand. More will be explained on this process in the lessons to come.
