Upcoming Events!

Come hear about Biomimicry at the next Foresight Green Drinks in Chicago!  
November 16th at 5:30pm (panel starts around 6:30)!  I'll be on a panel with Lindsay James of InterfaceFLOR and Colin Rohlfing of HOK, facilitated by Peter Nicholson - all Biomimicry Chicago core group members!

Biomimicry, the practice of learning from nature to solve human design problems, is emerging as a powerful tool for creating more sustainable solutions. Applied at a variety of scales, from individual products to buildings to organizations, biomimcry brings nature's 3.8 billion years of innovation experience to the design table.  This month's panel examines this quickly evolving practice, reviewing what it is, how it is being applied, the tangible advancements it has already produced, and the powerful potential for the future. Of specific interest to designers, architects, entrepreneurs, biologists, and related others, the conversation will be wide ranging and inspiring to anyone with a concern for a more vibrant and resilient future. Come learn more about this exciting field, and the new emerging network, Biomimicry Chicago.

And if you are out in the Northeast Illinois region, check out a CEU level presentation I'll be giving on Biomimicry for the AIA NEI Committee on the Environment.  November 10th at Wight & Co in Darien, IL.  

Nature is inherently sustainable and has been for over 3.8 billion years.  While we have been designing our world on a mass scale for approximately 200 years, our evolutionary elders have found a way to fit in on this planet for millennia.  Perhaps they have something to teach us? The emerging practice of biomimicry brings nature’s problem solving solutions to the design table by studying the processes, products, and performance of life on earth and translating their lessons into the language of design. 

Local Biomimicry

As a part of my coursework on Biomimicry's Life's Principle to "Be Locally Attuned and Responsive," I wrote an informal white paper on the intersection of Biomimicry and the Transition Town network using my town of Naperville, Illinois, as a case study.  I posed the question,

"What would Naperville look like if it followed the biomimicry principle to be ‘locally attuned and responsive’ in all of its (re)designs?"  

This fits in with our theme for the year at Greendrinks Naperville of local resilience in the face of peak oil and was written to further this discussion.  If you have time to spare and care to read and comment, I would love to hear your thoughts.  Read my paper "Local Biomimicry" here.  

Biomimicry at Greendrinks Naperville!

Amy is bringing biomimicry to the western suburbs of Chicago at the next Greendrinks Naperville.  Come here what biomimicry is all about and how you can use it to inspire sustainable design!

Wednesday, August 31st, 7pm at Sugar Toad in the Hotel Arista.

How will we feed ourselves?

Green Drinks - Naperville, an organization I help organize, has decided to delve deeply into the issues of local self-reliance and adaptability this year.  Every month, lectures will focus on the Transition Town initiative as we explore different ways that our community will adapt to peak oil and climate change.

This month's lecture was entitled "how will we feed ourselves?"  Steve Tiwald of the Green Earth Institute and Ron Nowiki of The Land Office discussed organic food production and permaculture, respectfully.

Highlights from Mr. Tiwald's lecture on organic gardening and community supported agriculture:

• There are approximately 6 billion critters in 1 cup of good, organic soil.  The use of petroleum based fertilizers kill these critters.
• 3 c's of organic gardening: Compost, Crop rotation, and Cover crops.  He likes red clover as a cover crop.
• Soybeans are now 80% genetically modified.  The organic seal forbids GMO.

Highlights from Mr. Nowiki's lecture on permaculture and Liberty Gardens

• By 2100, one-half of all species currently alive today will be extinct.  (We are in the middle of 6X, or the sixth major extinction our planet has faced.)
• "a child can only learn so much from a mown lawn"
• A 40' tree transpires 40 gallons of water per day +\-
• A linden or bass wood makes a delicious and flowery tea that is mildly sedative
• An AIA study determined that design changes alone can save 40% in energy costs. 
• Lemon grass makes a beautiful decorative grass in container arrangements with sage surrounding it.  Lemon grass makes a good tea. Ornamental grasses can be harvested and used as mulch under strawberries.
• Kwintis beans are a good pole bean.
• Another decorative arrangement is red cabbage in front of dinosaur kale.
• Tuscan kale - gorgeous tall fountain looking plant.
• Gooseberries for juice.
• Clove currant - fragrant plant with edible berry that doesn't taste that great.
• Apple service berry - gorgeous white glower tree with berry that looks like a blue berry but tastes like a seedy apple; autumn brilliance has a great fall color.
• Elderberry - mates a fritter; berry high in antioxidants, but invasive.
• Rhubarb grows in some shade.
• Hardy kiwi is a vine, also called grape kiwi; best when soft and mushy after a frost
• Neonicotinoids may be causing honeybee colony collapse disorder.
• Bird baths are popular and attract birds to eat insects.
• Succession of a mature landscape.  At first, mice and voles loved his permaculture yard.  Unitl a screetch owl moved in to help control that population.  
• Pesticides we use were evolved from chemical warfare from WW2.  Since production capacity was already there, it was just adapted to a new use.  But do you really want chemical warefare in your food?
• Victory gardens in 1944 produced 40% of produce consumed in the country.
• Compost, sand, and topsoil in equal parts make good soil starter.
• "Liberty Gardens," liberating ourselves from the industrial food supply.
• Sungold cherry tomato.
• Microgreens grow in the basement under lights.  Standard 4' fluorescent bulb almost as good as full spectrum lights.
• Forest gardening - martin Crawford; part shade gardening

References and Future Reading:

• Elliot Coleman, 4 season gardening and the new organic grower
• Rodale institute
• David Orr - Ecological Literacy
• Rogar Swang - Victory Gardens
• Liberty Gardens
• Hold to Nature
• Energy Bullitain