Biophilic City - Towards a ne Nature

Abstract

With the development of culture man created his city, slowly erasing and removing himself from the bio-centric world towards the machine-regulated world. Our modern city the mammoth jungle of concrete and glass has been designed to constrain, exclude and even erase the idyllic nature that once prevailed. The existence of humanity however goes beyond the invention of cities ten thousand years ago, to the origin of the genus Homo dated back to an estimated 2.4 million years. Thus for more than 99 percent of the history of mankind, people lived as hunter gatherers in close proximity to nature and other living organisms. The Biophilia hypothesis implies an ancestral connection to nature that E.O. Wilson explains as 'evolutionary logic', humanity evolved in adaptive response to natural conditions and stimuli, and as a result rooted in the biological structure of mankind is a deep desire to connect with the living world. This inherent connection attests that interaction with nature is essential for physical, mental, emotional and even spiritual well-being: for an enriched existence we need nature as an integral and ongoing part of our daily lives. The research adopts the theoretical background of Biophilia as starting point, and first of all re-evaluates the meaning of 'nature'. What is nature? What are the different layers of nature and how can we reintroduce the image of nature back into the city without destroying the urban fabric? The image of city as the antipodal condition to nature can be dissolved by completely re-thinking our city model, nature should not be viewed as 'the other' it ought to be immersed into our daily lives. This thesis aims to re-evaluate our meaning of city and nature, to create an environment of ongoing human experience that invites nature into the urban condition. In a city where the built environment overshadows and strips away the senses of man and his inherent desire to connect with the natural world, Biophilic interventions have been added to the urban fabric revealing a Satori : an intuitive enlightenment that attempts to restore some of the sublime that exists in nature and relieve humanity of their Biophilic needs.