…Within the POLYCENTRIC REGION, assure that buildings and structures are conducive to high-quality human experience.

* * *

Problem-statement: People have an instinctive need to be surrounded by the forms of nature, including biological nature. This need extends into the structures of cities, including their buildings.

Discussion:

Research has shown the importance of natural characteristics within the built environment for promoting human health and well-being. Yet many urban areas are harsh and unnatural, and as research has shown, these environments can produce high levels of stress, with negative impacts on human health and well-being.[1]

Many people recognize the value of greenery, especially in urban areas. Indeed, many cities have lush canopies of street trees and other vegetation. At the same time, many cities have buildings and building elements that also produce a biophilic effect to elicit positive emotional and physiological responses from users.[2]

Biophilia works by combining two mechanisms: an intimate contact (emotional, visual, physical, tactile) with living beings, and human response to geometries that are created by following biological rules. This does not, however, mean a superficial copying of natural forms, but is achieved through mimicking the very process by which living structure is generated. Biophilic design can be incorporated to improve the healing effects experienced in the built environment. Ten factors listed here contribute to enhance the human experience, and these can be combined into the “biophilic index B”.

  1. Sunlight
  2. Color
  3. Gravity
  4. Fractals
  5. Curves
  6. Detail
  7. Water
  8. Life
  9. Representations-of-nature
  10. Organized-complexity[3]

We cannot emphasize strongly enough that these are not stylistic suggestions, nor a personal preference, nor indeed a desire to turn to the past, but have everything to do with improving human health. Recent studies have documented the health improvements of persons who experience biophilic environments. Mainstream architecture is fast adopting these ideas. Biophilic design has the potential to revolutionize architecture and urbanism in the 2020s, perhaps to the same degree that Modernism did in the 1920s.

Biophilic design has been integrated into some of the most enduring and beloved urban and architectural works created since antiquity
Biophilic design has been integrated into some of the most enduring and beloved urban and architectural works created since antiquity: Above, forms of animals and plants are integrated into columns in the Igreja de Santiago, in Coimbra, Portugal. © Jl FilpoC via Wikimedia Commons.

Therefore:

Incorporate biophilic properties and their components into urban structures at all scales, down to the details, including buildings and ornaments.

* * *

Create biophilic urbanism with STREET TREES, FRACTAL PATTERN, HUMAN-SCALE DETAIL and CONSTRUCTION ORNAMENT. ...

  1. Much research confirms the increased stress levels including higher activation of the amygdala that are associated with negative experiences of urban living, in relation to exposure to more “natural” environments. See for example the work of Lederbogen, et al. published in Nature, “City living and urban upbringing affect neural social stress processing in humans” (2011): https://www.nature.com/articles/nature10190. Additional intriguing findings show that natural characteristics within the city can also produce important benefits, including naturalistic and “biophilic” elements of architecture. See for example Yannick Joye (2007). Architectural lessons from environmental psychology: The case of biophilic architecture. Review of General Psychology, 11(4), 305-328. https://jour- nals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1037/1089-2680.11.4.305
  2. For a deeper discussion of this topic, see Kellert, S.R., Heerwagen, J.H. and Mador, M.L., Editors (2008). Biophilic Design. The theory, science and practice of bringing buildings to life. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley & Sons.
  3. Salingaros, N.A. (2019) The Biophilic Index Predicts Healing Effects of the Built Envi- ronment. Journal of Biourbanism.

Design Patterns are easy-to-understand, easy-to-apply rules for creating human buildings and cities. They provide the long-term antidote to recent trends such as cutting down urban trees, creating heat islands, and erecting glass-and-steel high-rises. Rising temperatures in such urban environments threaten the population catastrophically. Violating patterns makes a city highly fragile, establishing a dangerous reliance upon imported energy. Systemic problems cannot be saved by industrial-technological fixes, but by efficient and climate-appropriate design that implements smart thermal planning (shading devices, earth-sheltering designs, etc.). Our cities will survive only if their structure follows patterns.

Mehaffy, Michael W., Yulia Kryazheva, Andrew Rudd, and Nikos A. Salingaros. A New Pattern Language for Growing Regions: Places, Networks, Processes. Portland, Oregon, USA: Sustasis Press, 2019.

Creative Commons License: Share Alike by Attribution https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode

In a special agreement, Sustasis Press has given Architexturez the rights to present twenty of the eighty new patterns from this book, for the exclusive use of architecture students in Asia. These patterns are relevant to a new era of urban challenges, meant to complement the classic 1977 book "A Pattern Language" by Christopher Alexander et al. The new book "A Pattern Language for Growing Regions" implements the New Urban Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals, including the need for urban resilience, sustainability, and quality of life. The publication of this volume also launches an online pattern language "repository", developed in collaboration with Ward Cunningham, the original wiki developer and pioneer of pattern languages of programming. 

See also …