Biophilic
Biophilic design interprets and reacts to the philosophy of biophilia, which describes the tendency of humans to want to be near or interact with the natural environment. It is an approach used in building design, material selection, interior design as well as urban planning. More recently these kinds of projects have also been referred to as nature based solutions and green blue solutions.
Biophilic design bears a relationship to, but differs from other related fields:
- Biomimicry is design that takes its inspiration from nature, in particular emulating natural solutions from an engineering perspective at all scales, it is the application of recognised biological concepts to fields that lie outside the discipline of biological science.
- Bio-inspired design or architecture is a broader term that considers a mimicking nature’s processes in terms of scientific understanding, in particular how things function, which may or may not impact form.
- Biomorphism relates much more to design solutions that resemble different elements from life and nature, visually.
- Bio-Design is a term more common to the field of medicine, via the implementation of inventions and interventions using biomedical technologies. Finally Bionic design or bionics is an interdisciplinary field that combines natural biological systems with modern technology looking at structures, methods and the processes of biological systems.
For more information see: Biophilic design.
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