Press Release:
Using the desert snail as inspiration for their design, a
team of students from the Art Institute of Isfahan in Iran took the top honor
in the third annual Biomimicry Student Design Challenge, organized by the
Biomimicry 3.8 Institute. The team, consisting of master’s level and
undergraduate students in architecture and business, conceived of a building
that makes use of self-shading, surface reflection, and insulation to create a
livable habitat rather than relying on air conditioning.
“The students from Isfahan created my favorite visual. When
I look at this building, I want to see it in real life—want to visit it, spend
a noon, night, and early morning in it—I can almost feel its shade and cool
breeze,” said Janine Benyus, Biomimicry 3.8 Institute co-founder and design
challenge judge. “While being completely modern in its sensibility, it is also
incredibly ‘fitting’ to its place. I can give this form the highest compliment
by saying that it looks like it belongs in the desert. And indeed, it does,
given that its inspiration comes from an ancient organism.”
“The team from Isfahan showed what is possible when we look
to nature as a source of good ideas rather than a warehouse of goods,” said
Megan Schuknecht, director of university education at the Biomimicry 3.8
Institute. “In this case, the students found inspiration from the desert snail,
which has learned not just how to survive but to thrive in an arid, hot
climate. Their snail-inspired building design is functional, beautiful, and
energy-efficient, and has the potential for great impact in their home
country.”
The team from the Art Institute of Isfahan will receive
$5,000 for their first place design. They acknowledged their win with the
following statement: “Winning this design challenge is overwhelmingly exciting.
Biomimicry took our notion of nature to a higher level and structured our point
of view and let us understand how to learn from nature in the path of design.
We will surely look to it as a major resource of learning and designing.”
Biomimicry 3.8 Institute staff and a panel of designers,
scientists, engineers, and business leaders judged the design challenge
proposals according to their understanding and application of biomimicry,
solution creativity, potential for impact, presentation quality, team
collaboration, and Life’s Principles (design lessons from nature).
Abstracts from every design proposal that was submitted are
available on www.biomimicrydesignchallenge.com.
“It has been a wonderful experience to see these young
minds, informed and inspired by nature's multi-billion year old textbook, bring
their innate intelligence, creativity, and exuberance to this competition,”
said Peter Boyer, artist and design challenge judge.
The second place award of $1,500 went to a team from the
University of Latvia for a sunlight-induced shading system that mimics how
flowers and stomata open and close. The third place prize of $750 went to a team
from the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden. They designed
click-on facade panels that can insulate existing buildings using snow.
Also, a team from the Oslo and Akershus University College
of Applied Sciences was awarded an Autodesk Sustainability Workshop Award of
$500 for their use of videos and related resources on the Autodesk
Sustainability Workshop website to minimize the environmental impact of their
design, which was an energy-saving hand-drying device. The winning entry from
the Art University of Isfahan also used Autodesk software, conducting thermal
analyses on their design using Ecotect Analysis.
The design competition launched in September 2011 and
attracted 50 entries from teams located in 14 US states and 10 countries. In
addition to Iran, international entries came from Canada, India, Norway,
Sweden, Latvia, Italy, the United Kingdom, and Turkey.
The challenge guidelines stated that biomimicry must be used
to design a solution that results in more efficient energy utilization and
ultimately reduces greenhouse gas emissions, ideally in the students’ local
environment. The main criteria were that the solution must be biomimetic and
feasible, and the teams must evaluate their designs using Life’s Principles.
Students were also highly encouraged to work in interdisciplinary teams.
“We wanted students from different academic backgrounds to
work together because biomimicry takes an interdisciplinary approach to
innovative, sustainable design. Biologists can explain how organisms employ
specific survival strategies, but other disciplines, such as chemists,
engineers, designers, architects, and business leaders are critical to moving
the biological strategy from concept to research to development to marketing.
That collaborative experience is invaluable for students who want to practice
biomimicry in the workplace,” said Schuknecht.
The Biomimicry Student Design Challenge received funding
from the Merck Family Fund and Autodesk.
The Biomimicry 3.8 Institute is a not-for-profit
organization founded in 2006 to promote the study and imitation of nature’s
remarkably efficient designs, and to bring together teachers, students,
scientists, engineers, architects, and innovators who can use natural models to
create sustainable technologies. The Biomimicry 3.8 Institute promotes learning
from and then emulating natural forms, processes, and ecosystems to create more
sustainable and healthier human technologies and designs.
No comments:
Post a Comment