Sustainable homes are about making a living with your work...at home. I grew up on a similar kind of home. We farmed 20 acres and supported an extended family of grandparent(s), parents and six children.
This story touches me deeply because it is about a treasure so fleeting and so powerful... and it is coming back into style after a very long hiatus.
Biomimicry
Institute, Autodesk Announce World's First Database of Nature-Inspired Design
Strategies
Imagine if buildings were as self-sufficient as living organisms: if
they could gather water, filter air, and adapt to local climate conditions.
Imagine if the natural world could teach us everything we need to know about
sustainable, efficient design.
AskNature.org
Now
for the first time, a new online database called AskNature.org will bring nature's best design ideas to
design tables around the world. The new project, created by the Biomimicry
Institute and sponsored by Autodesk, was announced on Nov. 21 at the Greenbuild
2008 conference in Boston.
AskNature.org
is a free, public-domain online library of nature's best design ideas,
organized by function and explained with illustrations and in language relevant
to designers.
AskNature.org is a project
of the Biomimicry Institute, founded by Janine Benyus, the renowned
author of the book Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature.
AskNature.org is collaborating with the Smithsonian Institute of
Natural History and E.O. Wilson's Encyclopedia of Life as a source of
data for the portal.
The portal explains in nontechnical language and enhanced with illustrations to
explain how things work. The portal helps architects, designers, and
engineers access and understand sustainable design concepts so they can
use them in their own products and projects.
Biomimetic Information
Autodesk
believes that biomimicry, as a design paradigm, can provide our
customers with design intelligence to help them make smarter design
decisions - whether they are designing a building, a train, a shoe or a
city. Looking ahead, Autodesk's goal is to make biomimetic information
accessible to a wide range of users globally. Autodesk product teams
are investigating technology intersections, including those with the
Autodesk® Seek web service, which has already made select biomimetic
products available to designers.
Architects,
designers and innovators can use this resource to study life's approaches to
sustainable design--for example, how butterflies create pigment-free color, or how plants split
water to release hydrogen.
"The
core idea is that there is no need to reinvent the wheel. After 3.8 billion
years of evolution, nature has already found the solutions to the
sustainability challenges humans face," said Janine Benyus, founder of the
non-profit Biomimicry
Institute
and author of Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature.
AskNature.org--part search engine, part social network--is a place where biologists and
innovators can meet, exchange information and design together. The site also
has a feature called "Thank a Genius," which encourages
the investment of a portion of profits derived from bio-inspired innovations to
go toward preserving the organisms and ecosystems that inspired the
breakthrough.
AskNature.org
is sponsored by Autodesk, a
world leader in design innovation technology. With a user
base of 9 million architects, designers and engineers around the world,
Autodesk sees biomimicry as a revolutionary design concept that can help
influence better design decisions.
A growing number of businesses are using biomimicry to solve their design
challenges. As one example, the architectural firm HOK is planning a community
development in India that seeks to mimic tree roots with its foundation
structure, as a way to deal with soil stability problems. They are also
designing roofs that shed water during monsoon season and also store water for
use in the drought season--just like trees do in that environment.
Biomimicry at Greenbuild
2008
Janine
Benyus, along with renowned Harvard biologist E. O. Wilson announce the launch of
AskNature.org. on November 21, 2009. Wilson's Encyclopedia of Life is integrated with the
AskNature.org database.
