Eco Design for Earth Day
We’ve been working on something very fun in our studio lately. In celebration of Earth Day, today, April 22, we launched an Eco Design workshop with a class at Cal State Channel Islands. The class was actually an English class, studying fiction- more specifically, writings featuring post- apocalyptic future scenarios. The professor thought that the students should end on a more positive note, so she invited The Human Nature Center to teach our unit on Eco Design.
Why eco design as the lens for this class project? Because these students, like all of us actually, are imagining futures. Instead of imagining futures we fear, we’d like to imagine futures we love. Imagination is a key design tool! Eco Design follows the cyclical and life-feeding patterns of the natural world, so it’s a perspective and toolset we can use to build systems that cycle on forever in a healthy way just like natural ecosystems do.
What exactly is Eco Design? Eco Design, also called Regenerative Design, is the practice of designing homes, landscapes, and their components as part of the regenerative rhythms and cycles of nature. Eco Design is actually nothing new. Our ancestors - and a number of cultures today- are eco designers by necessity. Many incredible cultures have made living in harmony with the earth into strong and beautiful lifeways. It’s time for us to go back to the future.
Anyone of us can become an eco designer at any moment. Some key components to beginning to think like an eco designer:
Observing and listening deeply
Honoring and emulating the intelligence of other living species and natural cycles
And appropriately using the materials of our local places to live well
All students received a kit with a compass, paints, paper, pencils, rulers, and handouts to design their own future homes according to some basic eco principles that we learned together in a live Zoom workshop. Now they will be observing their actual home spaces as the basis to build a model of their dream home. We’ll meet back together in a couple of weeks to share our projects and insights.
For now, the seeds of inspiration have been planted- and we hope for you too. As one student said, “This [workshop] made me feel so relaxed and got me thinking about the negative and positive ways we can think about our future! I loved this so much. Thank you!”
