When I started at the International Living Future Institute almost 10 years ago, I could not have imagined the success that we have achieved today. With over 650 Living Building projects in 23 countries, two thriving international Institutes, 27 affordable housing projects, and hundreds of Declare labels, we are now positioned for scale. Our success is possible because of the incredible community that shares our vision and demonstrates an unwavering commitment to its realization. I am so proud of the journey that we have been on together.

Today I would like to share with you that in early December, I advised the Board of Directors that I would be stepping down as CEO of ILFI at the beginning of February. I have always focused on having an exemplary leadership team in place so we have a strong bench for the future. The leadership team, together with members of the ILFI Board, has formed a transition team that will lead ILFI while the search begins for a new CEO.

I have been engaged with ILFI since my founding board position with the Cascadia Green Building Council in 2000. Now, with the organization in a strong position and with our programs ready to scale, the moment to transition to the next leader has come.

I will take what I have learned from leading this incredible, passionate community and continue to impact the world in new ways. I believe this is the decade that counts for global climate change and life on Earth as we know it, and I know that I will continue to work alongside you as we envision and bring forth a Living Future for all.

Thank you for your support of ILFI’s mission: to catalyze the transformation toward a more culturally rich, socially just and ecologically restorative future. I will be eternally proud of what we have accomplished together over the last decade, and am deeply grateful for your support.

Now that we are into the second decade of the Living Building Challenge (LBC), the world’s most rigorous green building program, it is an appropriate time to reflect. It’s now time to wonder both whether we have achieved the impact we sought to create and how we can continue to lead the building industry through the next decade in order to create as much additional impact as possible.

The Living Building Challenge was intended to be both visionary and provocative. It would stretch what had become merely acceptable as a green building toward a new definition of green building that would actually start to reverse global climate change, heal our polluted environment and restore our world’s ecosystems. The LBC filled a void for those who sought a deeply transformational approach to buildings, one measured by performance rather than points or lists. With over 100 certified and nearly 550 registered projects – projects ranging from small, single-family homes to environmental centers to massive commercial buildings – we have both the people who know and the square footage to show that the impossible is possible.

While we’ve been successful in showing that the impossible is possible, our progress needs to accelerate, both in the mainstream green building market and in stretching that market towards regenerative design and systems-thinking. Our natural systems are declining rapidly; the International Panel on Climate Change’s report last fall outlines that we have only 12 years before the implications of climate change start to irreparably alter the world as we know it:

“Pathways limiting global warming to 1.5C would require rapid and far-reaching transitions in energy, land, urban and infrastructure… including buildings and transportation.”

All of this has spurred deep reflection while we internally considered a new version of the Living Building Challenge standard. Together with analysis of the iterative feedback received from registered and certified Living Buildings and from our third party auditors, I realized that we needed to embark on a journey to achieve two new goals. First, we needed to simplify the program so that Living Building project teams are spending the majority of their time in creating the most impact. Second, we sought to fill the gap between the highest levels of mainstream green building certifications and the entry point to the Living Building Challenge certifications while keeping the ambitions and rigor of the LBC intact.

Some of the biggest barriers to achieving the Living Building Challenge have laid with one of its most compelling visions – absolutism. Achieving the standard’s Red List Imperative for 100% non-toxic chemicals and its requirement for FSC wood has led to many layers of exceptions. LBC allows for exceptions because we recognize the limitations of the market, but the result is project teams who actually achieve closer to 80% of the goal and spend a large portion of their time seeking solutions and requesting exceptions for the remaining 20%. As well, while we have made incredible progress towards making the Materials Petal more achievable, transforming the entire building materials industry towards transparency along the way, Water Petal compliance is still limited by cost issues and respective health department regulations.

As with any new version of the Living Building Challenge, the search for performance-based and systems-based solutions is a continual exploration. When a project aspires to attain the ideal, we believe that the genius of the project team’s design response – both their challenges and their successes – should be the basis on which we evolve the Challenge. The Living Building Challenge version 4.0 will embrace this approach fully and evolve alongside our project teams.  Together we will continue to innovate and deepen our vision for achieving a society that is socially just, culturally rich and ecologically restorative.

The Living Building Challenge 4.0 will be released on May 1^st at the Living Future unConference in Seattle, WA.

Last week, a report was released from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, or 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit. Starkly depicting a grim prognosis of the difference in a half degree Celsius, the report quantified the remaining time we have for transformation–as little as 12 years.

There are three points that I would like to share about this report that give me hope:

1. The challenge ahead of us is enormous but clear: The IPCC report estimates that the world would need to emit no more than 1,080 billion tons of carbon for a 1-in-3 chance of successfully limiting global warming; if we limit our emissions to only 570 billion tons of carbon, the chance goes up to 2-in-3. In our data-driven world, this is a metric that we can check, follow and meet.
2. This is the first climate report of this magnitude that was requested by governments. Based on hundreds of nominations from more than 100 world governments, the report is authored by a multi-disciplinary team of scientists that take into account scientific expertise, geographic representation, gender balance and prior IPCC experience. Its impact has reached farther than any other IPCC report, and the fact that government leaders wanted it will greatly increase its impact in the offices where those very same leaders are now discussing it: “We have presented governments with pretty hard choices. We have pointed out the enormous benefits of keeping to 1.5C, and also the unprecedented shift in energy systems and transport that would be needed to achieve that,” said Jim Skea, a co-chair of the IPCC working group. “We show it can be done within laws of physics and chemistry. Then the final tick box is political will. We cannot answer that. Only our audience can–and that is the governments that receive it.”
3. The report dictates what must be the focus of our work ahead: “Pathways limiting global warming to 1.5C would require rapid and far-reaching transitions in energy, land, urban and infrastructure… including buildings and transportation.” Just this past month, the International Living Future Institute reached an impressive milestone, one that we have been gunning toward for ten years: 100 certified Living Building Challenge projects. These projects span the world and showcase examples of the change required, and they are not alone.

Joseph Campbell once said about his belief that there are heroes in each of us, “I don’t have to have faith, I have experience.”  The hard work of cities, communities and projects accepting the challenge of transformation give us at the Institute hope–not based in faith, but based in experience–that the work required is possible and, if we can come out the other end, will create the future we all truly want to live in.

All too often, our buildings do not give us the chance to connect with nature. Buildings with few or no windows, no fresh air, and views of something uninspiring, a wall or a parking lot, are all too common. Given that we spend 90 percent of our time inside, this means many of us are living the majority of our lives completely cut off from the natural world—in a sense, cut off from a part of ourselves.

As Biophilic Design gains momentum, gathering data about the health benefits of people connecting to nature is in demand. Much of the research findings on the health benefits of people connecting to nature is intuitive. If we were to awaken our awareness of how we feel when we are in vibrant and varied light, for example, we would not be surprised to see that research shows that patients in hospitals heal faster when in a room with daylight, or that test scores in schools improve when a classroom has natural daylighting.

Since Roger Ulrich published a study on hospital recovery rates being influenced by patients contact with nature in 1984, several other studies have shown the link between access to nature and productivity, which can serve as a proxy for health and well-being. Some of the studies, such as one published by Kate Lee and others in the Journal of Environmental Psychology¹, suggests that even a 40-second spell looking at an image of a green roof improves focus and productivity. The wealth of research showing that exposure to nature improves productivity and creativity has not gone unnoticed by large companies such as Google, Facebook, and Amazon—all of which have implemented Biophilic Design and the exposure of their employees to nature in the design of their buildings over the past few years.

As we get close to the predictions that 70% of people live in urban areas, we will become more separated from nature than ever before. It is imperative that our buildings bring nature and nature’s principles inside, that they blur the boundaries between inside and outside, and allow us as inhabitants of this planet to fulfill our instinctual need for being part of nature. However, we have a plethora of buildings across the US that cannot ever provide any daylight and other elements of biophilic design to their occupants without significant retrofitting. Square buildings with large internal floorplates force thousands of people to be separated from the outside walls and be ignorant of the time of day, weather, or the smells and sounds of nature.

A plague of schools was built in the 1960’s and 70’s with the belief that a view of the outside world would be a distraction to learning. Classrooms without any natural daylight were not only legal, they were encouraged across the US. Globally, however, many countries had the opposite opinion, and the width of buildings was and still is limited to ensure that all occupied spaces have adequate access to natural daylight and views to outside. Our current codes support the belief that as long as air is circulated through ducts and fans and artificial lights are adequate, that access to daylight is not necessary. This approach to restrict such a basic human need will not be easy to change.

Without adequate codes to ensure that our connection to nature can thrive, we can shift building owners and developers to create buildings that achieve biophilic design by utilizing the wealth of health data to make a clear value proposition to employers whose largest expense is their employees. However, we cannot rely on research and studies alone – it has been 35 years since the first study linked daylight in hospitals to healing rates and yet in the last 35 years we have continued to build and remodel hospitals that restrict daylight to patients. Our buildings have a significant impact on our health and yet conversations about human health have not historically included architects, designers or real estate developers. How do we ensure that this critical health issue is addressed?

Like any change to and transformation of the status quo, we will need to approach the shift to Biophilic Design adoption using systems thinking approaches. All aspects of how we create our built environment need to change, starting with each of us awakening our connection to nature and starting to demand spaces that allow that connection to thrive. We should not allow our children to spend their days with no daylight or time outside when study after study shows that kids learn better, interact with other people more positively and have a stronger sense of self-esteem and hope with daylight. Together let’s transform our buildings, starting with each of us answering the question – How will I bring nature inside?

Header photo: Josey Pavilion; photo courtesy of Josey Pavilion 

Notes

1. Lee, Kate; Williams, Kathryn; Sargent, Leisa; Williams, Nicholas; Johnson, Katherine. Journal of Environmental Psychology, June 2015, Volume 42

Biophilic Design takes the concept of biophilia, love of life, and applies it to the built environment while specifically looking at the relationship between people and nature in our buildings and cities.

At ILFI, we decided to make biophilic design a core strategy for us. In order to create a world full of living buildings and living communities, we need to fundamentally shift the approach that people have toward nature and restore the relationship. We need to transform the relationship we currently have, where people dominate nature, to be one where people and nature truly coexist and where people are part of nature. Our buildings can really be designed with that in mind.

Ultimately, biophilic buildings create spaces that are healthier and happier for people to be in. People tend to thrive and be more productive around nature. When they’re able to see the patterns of light through the day or what the weather is like, they have a greater sense of inner-calm and an ability to be at their best.

What I also see in biophilic design projects is the real intent to create a variety of spaces that allow for different types of learning or different types of working. One of the things we’ve learned from working at the Bullitt Center is that providing an extra space in our lobby which was previously a pass-through space that’s intentionally designed to create different types of  spaces for people – a sofa for people to work, an area for different types of conversations, places for people to be quiet, places for people to be active. We created spaces to foster a dynamic and creative environment.

Fundamentally, biophilic design should be fun. I think it brings back the fun of creativity into how we create buildings for people to thrive. This concept hasn’t really been prevalent in how we think about the design of buildings.

The withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement today is deeply disappointing as well as foolish, particularly given that renewable energy is now being realized on such a significant scale throughout the US.

However, great leaps forward usually come from the innovators and risk takers – those that have the guts, foresight and empathy to think beyond themselves and visualize a future where all species thrive. Repeating a history that pillages the future for the next generation in the name of greed is not only short-sighted it is also proven to cost more in the long-term. Our numerous EPA Superfund sites are a testimony to that.

Today we are even more grateful for our Living Future movement –  regenerative designers, sustainability advocates, people with hearts that bleed green not because it is politically expedient, but because it is morally imperative. We will continue to harness and empower their vision for a truly Living Future for all in order to achieve the objectives of the Paris Climate Agreement, with or without the White House.

We must all continue to make progress in our communities. Here are three things that you can do right now:

1. Join the Living Future Network, a global community of leaders that are creating powerful change in over 52 countries.

2. Get inspired to take action by reading the latest Curbed article on how architects can lead the fight against climate change.

3. Tell us how you plan to take action on Twitter. Let’s encourage each other to continue toward a Living Future.

For many of us it has been hard to cling to a sense of hope when we see basic human rights such as clean water, clean air, and freedom of religion under attack. Our work here at the Institute often requires courage as we seek to create a Living Future for all. Van Jones has been on the forefront of making positive change for our world, from founding Green for All and DreamCorps to his current role with CNN. As a changing political climate was brewing, my intuition told me that we would need courage and the genius of brilliant ideas to keep our work moving forward this year. Having Van agree to keynote the Living Future Conference almost a year ago cemented this vision.

Genius and Courage is the theme that Van will open for us when we gather in Seattle this May. We will come together to regain hope and continue the momentum that we have built toward creating living, healthy, and thriving communities.Leading up to Living Future we are committing to 10 courageous actions.

1. Get outside—get engaged with those who support and protect our precious natural treasures. Visit one National Park with a child, pass on your appreciation and reverence for our uniquely American landmarks, and support the National Parks Foundation.

2. Write a letter to support the diversity that makes our country the richest in the world. For letter-writing advice and other ways to support refugees, visit OXFAM.

3. Engage in a #messytruth conversation with someone you care about today, get inspired about how to do that with the #LoveArmy—the organization founded by Dream Corps and our LF keynote speaker, Van Jones.

4. Sign the petition to #FixFlint so that we can combat environmental racism in cities like Flint, Michigan.

5. Go Net Zero – support the rapidly growing market by making your home or business Net Zero Energy.

6. Join our volunteer network of engaged, global citizens who are working to bring sustainable design to their city.

7. Contribute to an organization that provides political empowerment for underrepresented communities. We like Presente, the largest national Latinx online organization advancing social justice with technology, media, and culture, co-founded by our LF artist in residence Favianna Rodriguez.

8. Ask your employer to make a commitment to transparency by disclosing social justice and equity policies through JUST.

9. Get out of your bubble by organizing your neighborhood to perform a (nonpolitical) day or afternoon of service to a local organization.

10. Make a commitment to lighten your personal footprint by choosing to buy less stuff, eat less meat, and take alternative transportation.

I invite you to join us in this commitment and share your actions and courage with us by using #CourageousFuture. Join us at the Living Future unConference in Seattle, May 17-19.

Biophilic design was the reason I became an architect. I developed a deep-rooted love of life when backpacking around Australia in my early twenties. The sheer beauty of the country, its unique flora and fauna, and the vast expanse of pristine land was life changing. The Australian landscape stood in stark contrast to the developed cityscapes of England where I grew up.

I entered architecture with the commitment to connect people and nature through the buildings that we spend 90% of our time within. Most of us have experienced buildings where the movement of the sun through the sky creates shadows and pools of light that connect us to the time of day, the season, and our sense of inner rhythm. There is a regenerative, lasting power in these moments, spurring the formation of memories that we carry through life.

For example, buying a home with a view will always come with a premium, and when eagerly making early reservation at a favorite restaurant we aim to get the table near the window. As occupants of buildings we are drawn to spaces that interact with nature. But often we are left with spaces that do not give us that choice, ones that have no windows, no fresh air, or views of anything other than a wall and parking lot.

Biophilic design has been practiced for thousands of years, but since the industrial age we have used our buildings to assert domination over nature and to highlight our separation from it. Once electricity became widespread, naturally ventilated and lit buildings became a thing of the past. Energy was apparently plentiful and able to be wasted. People became reliant on automation of their air and were trained to be passive observers and to no longer manually open windows or pull down shutters. With the advent of the air conditioner we could be kept at a perfect temperature, no matter what the external environment. Now that the impacts of global climate change require us to move to urgent solutions, buildings and their 40% share of the energy consumed are an essential influencer. We have to radically reduce the energy consumed by buildings in order to meet the goals established at the UN Climate Change Conference (COP21) in Paris earlier this year, and our approach to designing buildings has to be unraveled in order to move us beyond small incremental change.

Biophilic design is a conscious discipline, and has the potential to intentionally reconnect people and nature through buildings. Some project teams have tried it out by adding plants and trees or a fountain in their buildings. Stopping there and going no further, these teams miss the power of this new discipline to completely revolutionize the way that we create and design our places. The opportunity of biophilic design is to connect to the particular ecology of the place, to its culture, history and beauty and to create a building that will regenerate life.

Today more than half of the world’s population lives in urban environments, and the UN projects that by 2050 that number will grow to 66%: “Urbanization brings opportunities for more efficient development and improved access to drinking water and sanitation. At the same time, problems are often magnified in cities, and are currently outpacing our ability to devise solutions,” commented Ban Ki-moon. City supplies of water, food, energy will have to double to match the need presented by urban growth. Within this future shuffle for needs, it is easy to see how place and nature could be lost. Biophilic city–scale initiatives, rooted in biophilic design, have sprouted up to combat this disconnection and produce positive community impacts: reinvigorated urban natural systems, economic capital resilience and a focus on quality of life.

In any crisis it is often simpler to isolate an issue and focus deeply on it alone. Yet, the solution that may fix that one issue will prove to make another worse. The crises we collectively face are not siloed. To achieve sustainability and resiliency, biophilic design and a systems-thinking approach that allows us to take inspiration from nature are required.

There is no easy checklist to bring biophilic design into mainstream design practice, no single guidebook, no rules and regulations that can be put into code language. It is a philosophy that requires a shift in thinking. But more profoundly, it requires each individual to draw on the instinct that guides us to pay more for a home with a view of a park, the mountains, or the water, or to live on a street lined with trees. If we were to listen to that instinct we would not need research that proves we are more productive, happier, and healthier when our buildings connect us to nature. That research is available, but research alone will not alone lead to adoption. If we are looking for proof—waiting for the doctor to prescribe that we take inspiration from nature—then we are missing the point and will miss the opportunity.

Stephen Kellert, Judi Heerwagen, and Terrapin Bright Green have developed thoughtful Elements and Patterns that create categories of biophilic design and provide a framework for integrating the thinking into a project. Projects are embracing these frameworks and making some strides, but for broad adoption to happen we still need a mind shift in thinking that is systems based. We need built examples that can demonstrate how their design approach was transformed because biophilic design was the driver for the design concept. We need built examples that intentionally pull on the instinctual connection to nature that is within all of us. We need built examples that demonstrate the transformation that occurred and the beauty that was created for every occupant of that space.

Together we must change the way we train architects and designers so that they can think and act systematically, developing inspirational tools to communicate this need with building owners and developers. For this reason, many of us with a passion for reconciling our relationship to nature and for regenerating life have joined together. Broad adoption of biophilic design is our mission. We believe we can only achieve this by many coming together, through looking systematically at the issue and addressing education, tools, resources, inspiration, collaboration, and research. There is no cost barrier, there is no regulatory barrier; the only barrier is ourselves—our behavior, our habitual patterns of thinking of nature as the other and as something to be dominated and ignored. Making systemic change to the design of the built environment will not happen overnight, but a movement is building.

To learn more about biophilic design and how to put it into practice, check out the Biophilic Design Initiative.

Over the past few months, ILFI staff and board have finalized a new strategic plan that will guide the organization over the next five years. The opportunity to witness the collaboration between friends and colleagues throughout this process has filled me with energy and optimism for the future. We’re proud of where the organization is heading, and invite you to take a look at the plan. Our work will continue to be guided by the challenges of climate change, energy and resource scarcity, and social inequity. To create this plan, we reflected on our successes and growth points, and arrived at a three key goals:

• Growing our roots
• Strengthening our core
• Widening our circle

The organization has reached a tipping point. We are transitioning from a fledgling organization to an established non-profit.  As we move into our new role, it is critical that we continue to uphold the same standard of integrity and commitment to measurable results.
The past ten years would not have been possible without ILFI’s founder, Jason F. McLennan and his tireless optimism and vision. Jason’s success in transforming the building industry’s paradigm has paved a path for ILFI to continue to make significant positive progress.

I am honored to assume the new role as CEO, and look forward to implementing the new five-year strategic plan. Together we have outlined an inspiring pathway to 2020, but we can’t get there without you. Whether you attend our events, inspire change as an Ambassador, partner with us as a sponsor, fund our efforts or engage with one or more of our programs, each one of you plays a vital role in carrying ILFI to the next level. I am grateful for your support as a member of our community of passionate individuals. Thank you for believing in the possibility of a Living Future.

I am thrilled to announce the release of Trim Tab v.28 in tandem with the launch of the vision for the next five years. In this issue, we celebrate Jason’s ten years of service; explore homes that exemplify proven performance; underline the importance of holistic design strategies; provide anecdotes that show the urgency of divestment; and more.

Learn more about ILFI’s Strategic Vision from Amanda Sturgeon during her keynote and sessions at the tenth annual Living Future unConference in Seattle next month. 

In the last 20 years, the green building movement has gone mainstream. The pace of change is extraordinary: at the International Living Future Institute we are pushing boundaries we couldn’t have even imagined a decade ago. Setting a high bar, one that many thought unachievable, has proven to be a catalyst for transformative change. And it’s time to do it again.

As I begin my transition to CEO, my staff and I are exploring new strategies that will help us bolster the fullness of our mission: to create a future that is socially just, culturally rich and ecologically restorative. We must devote our collective attention to what might be the biggest challenge of all—to create a future that embraces and empowers everyone. To create a future that is inclusive and robust for all: #OurLivingFuture. If we are to succeed, it’s critical that we have your participation.

With this in mind, we recently hosted a new event, the Equity Drafting Table, held in cooperation with the Seattle Design Festival. Our aim was to begin a dialogue about what it means to design a fair and just place for everyone to live. When we first imagined this event, we knew we needed to include everyone at the table, all ages, abilities and backgrounds. We quickly realized that we won’t get there overnight: first, we have to foster a culture of inclusivity. We designed an interactive installation, a maze of difficult questions that prompted a response from each participant. We rallied a number of eager partner organizations in the community, and were delighted by an excellent turnout. Residents from all aspects of Seattle’s rich tapestry were in attendance and provided their input.

This event was a promising launching pad, but it was just the beginning.

The good news is that we already have some momentum behind #OurLivingFuture. Each of our programs has an equity component that has resulted in measurable impacts (Just^TM, the Equity Petal in each of our Challenges, Living Building Challenge Framework for Affordable Housing). But it’s not enough.

Over the next few years, we will seek to answer this question more fully: What does it take to make communities inclusive and robust for everyone? The question is one that everyone can reflect upon, and the answers will look different from one community to the next.

A Living Future looks different for every person. It is not just a place for the wealthy or privileged; instead, it is a diverse collection of habitats that operate in tandem with the natural world and without friction with one another; it is a place where everyone belongs and a place that belongs to everyone.

What will you do to make your community inclusive and robust for everyone? Please join us in conversation around #OurLivingFuture, at our events and online. We want to hear your voice. The future is not just yours or mine, it’s ours.