Your Home’s Connection to Nature

Nature is one of the world’s everlasting wonders. There is such a range of beauty, life, and design to be found in nature that it indeed seems a never-ending process of discovery within one’ lifetime. Nature has so many benefits for humankind, beyond the resources it provides to us for our activities, sustenance, and lives. When we are living in cities, we often think of nature as something that we have to travel to experience – such as a trip to the mountains or to the beach. However, there are numerous ways to integrate nature within our homes, no matter whether the house is located in an urban, suburban, or rural setting.

A popular concept in recent years is that of biophilia, one that taps into the innate appreciation of natural elements that humans experience when exposed to plants, animals, and natural systems such as streams of water. Biophilic design integrates natural elements or abstractions and representations of nature in different ways into the spaces that people occupy in order to induce the subtle appreciations in the everyday environment. Direct examples include the placement of plants in spaces or views to trees through windows. Indirect examples include the abstraction of geometric patterns found in nature, such as the Fibonacci series, which are integrated into wallpaper designs. Both examples demonstrate a physiological response in people with lowered heart-rate variability, indicating a reduction of stress in these environments.

As an architect and designer, I enjoy the process of bio-analytical design. This is a process of abstracting concepts, functions, mechanisms of nature or biological entities and applying them in new ways through design. This process is more commonly referred to as biomimicry, but I don’t believe in direct mimicry of nature but rather learning from an extraction of its principles and functions. Bio-analytical design slightly different than biophilic design. Bio-analytical does not necessarily translate directly into a representation of a natural element but may appear to be quite mechanical, utilitarian, or machine-like.

Biophilic design, on the other hand, will continue to hold an aesthetic correlation to nature through one of the human senses. This is one of the reasons people love fresh flower arrangements in their spaces since these bring both visual and aromatic enjoyment. For those of us with pollen allergies, arrangements of natural elements such as branches and berries can bring the same appreciations sans the scent. When designing a home or making renovations, consider the placement of windows for connecting to nature outside. Beautiful examples of window placement will frame the views of trees or garden shrubbery or even groundcover in unique ways. The sky and patterns of clouds and changing colors can be framed with skylights, connecting us to nature through the changing qualities of light throughout the day and seasons. So, no matter whether your home is situated in nature or in a dense urban neighborhood, you can have nature integrated in your living spaces.  

If you have any questions about design strategies for connecting your home with nature, reach out to AIDA, LLC today for a consultation.You can always find more information and healthy home resources at Aletheia Ida Design and Architecture, LLC (AIDA, LLC) at www.aletheiaida.com.