Sabah Zdanowska - Creativity in Design Blog

Critiquing Biophilic Design - Is It Too Human Centric?

When I was a child I loved helping my mum in the garden. Of us five siblings, I was the only one that would mow our lawn, re-pot plants and try to create new life from cuttings.

I remember those experiences well as they were happy moments in what was mostly an unhappy childhood. I was calmer, more positive and energised when I was in our garden or at the park. I have since wondered: what this just me? I never thought so...

Pleasure from the natural environment

It was years later before I saw some kind of confirmation that people genuinely drive pleasure from being in the natural environment or growing and tending to plants. It's not just about making places superficially pretty.

A fascinating article in the New York Times Magazine titled: The Island Where People Forget to Die told the story of Stamatis Moraitis who returned to his Greek home island when close to dying from lung cancer, but went on to live another 35 years - harvesting vegetables and producing wine on this farm.

Judi Dench in 2017 presented a wonderful documentary called "My Passion For Trees", which for me really bought home how people can connect with nature and have it really enrich their lives - as it seemed for her and her beautiful old Oak tree.

Biophilic Design for our Project

After defining what values were important to us for our project (empowerment, sustainability and tech not for the sake of it), we came across biophilia and biophilic design.

Biophilia - A human’s intrinsic need for exposure to natural environments.
Biophilic design - designing features that re-connect people with nature to improve health and well-being.

Here it was! What I strongly felt was a 'thing' and what the article and documentary were hitting on was an intrinsic human need. After we discovered that there was actual research on the subject of Biophilic design and some studies on the impact of this rather vaguely worded "antimicrobial allelochemic volatile organic compound" called Phytoncide and the benefits of forest therapy, we were keen to have these inform our own designs.

Below are the three conceptual designs I came up with, sketched, found images for and annotated - and are included in the group presentation slides.

Vertical garden

The Vertical Garden That Moves had much potential for tackling pollution and providing a space for city workers and dwellers to get close to nature.

All Weather Smart Planter

The All Weather Smart Planter was a practical and feasible idea that could genuinely help people to grow plants at any time of year and in any conditions.

Forest therapy

The Smart Forest Therapy Spots idea was lot tech, but would make the city a much more green place to live.

As well as having nature thrive, according to research with some forest therapy people would too.

Critiquing the designs

All of these ideas met the smart city design criteria to various degrees - but they were so human-only-centric.

Although I made considerations to attract bees and butterflies, I had not considered other insects and animals. Is it important that I should, or is providing a small sanctuary for just for humans ok for us to design for?

Did the all weather smart planter really help people to connect with nature in the same way Judi does with her Oak tree? My sense was that in making plants so easy to care for, humans won't really need to care at all. The design also did not consider the wider ecosystem. Bees would not be able to get in if the protective covers are down. So what then?

The Smart Forest Therapy Spots I would love to have as an addition to any city and perhaps we could have explored more on how to design for human well-being. What put us off was that we were only thinking of humans and not about habitats for other species. After thinking over my individual exploration in and around Blackheath, I wanted to focus our efforts more on how we could design something for the smart city that wasn't just for humans.

Reflection - Is Biophilic Design too Human-Centric?

The experience of coming up with these conceptual designs was to really make me think about biophilic design and how the concept is really very human centered. The concept has come from the building and architecture industries and although it considered benefits to the environment, of sustainability and resiliance, non-humans are clearly a secondary consideration.

The idea behind Biophilic design is that to design for nature and immersion in nature is really to design for us humans and an intrinsic need we have evolved to have.

Over the course of the project, I think I was the team member that was most keen on designing for sustainability. However, even I had to work hard to think beyond human-centered design and to learn how to consider the needs of other life on our planet in more than a superficial way. Why is it so hard for us to consider animals - including the ones that are genetically similar to humans as conscious beings with feelings?

I came across an interview in The National Geographic Magazine titled: "Yes, Animals Think And Feel. Here's How We Know." The author Carl Safina of the book: Beyond Words: How Animals Think and Feel put it plainly: "In laboratories the dogma persists: don’t assume that animals think and have emotions–and many scientists insist that they do not. With the public, I think it’s quite different. Many people simply assume that animals act consciously and base their belief on their own domestic animals or pets. Other people do not want animals to be conscious because it makes it easier for us to do things to animals that would be hard to do if we knew they were unhappy and suffering."

Have we collectively and perhaps unconsciously decided that we just don't want to know about the suffering we cause other species? I think I have to agree, as uncomfortable as that feels.

This process made me decide that being non-human design focused is a choice. You have to accept that hard truth about how we treat animals to be able to genuinely design for biodiversity. Not as a secondary consideration. Not as a nice to have. Only then can we find ways to connect and empathise with other creatures and find creative ways to design a world that works for all of us.

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