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NEW proof that Biophilic Design increases the Value (£) of the Workplace!

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NEW proof that Biophilic Design increases the Value (£) of the Workplace!

Did you know for every £1 you spend on even simple Biophilic Design enhancements, you could get £2.70 back? So reveals the new research conducted by Joyce Chan Shoof Architect and Sustainability Lead at the UK Parliament.

Using a scientific approach with control environments, adding biophilic design elements to test the effect and then removing them to further test the effect of their absence, Joyce explains the rigorous approach she took over a seven-year period to arrive at her conclusion.

This is a phenomenal breakthrough for those of us working in Biophilic Design.

You can read the whole report here: https://plplabs.com/reap-what-you-sow-2/

And come and see Joyce present the research in person at Workplace Trends in London on the 18th April 2024 https://workplacetrends.co/events/wtrs24-prog/

We often have struggled trying to articulate the economic benefits of Biophilic Design, this research can be used to support arguments why businesses need it in the workplace.

Joyce has also developed a framework to help designers work out what we need and the impact it will have. Using existing frameworks, like the Flourish model (as advocated by Professor Derek Clements Croome) and others, she has woven a great new model we can all hang our designs on…. READ ON and LISTEN TO THE PODCAST

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Creating Eden

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Creating Eden

The UK is one of the most nature-depleted countries and this fact is yet another reason we need more Biophilic Design included into urban planning, architecture, design, and every environmental facet of city and town life.

Robert Delius, Associate Director, Architect and Head of Sustainability at Stride Treglown is doing just that. Aiming to maximise biodiversity through design, Robert has a passion to create an Eden, where buildings and landscapes come together and there's a feeling of abundance, where there's nature and birdsong and insect life and a powerful sense of well-being.

 

Robert’s background in housing design and master planning has set him up in good stead to create good design and great places.  Distinctiveness and place making are a thread through his career.  He also has a particular interest in regenerative design and how great design can have a measurably positive impact on climate, ecology and people.  In short, he is a brilliantly creative proactive advocate for Biophilic Design.

 

He believes that forging a closer connection to the natural world, is extremely good for our well-being as well as being good for the planet and good for nature, and his passion for Biophilic Design is life-long. One of the projects he discusses is his Great Bow Yard project in Somerset from 2008. This had gained media attention because it had been flagged as the most energy efficient scheme in the UK.  Having recently revisited the project, Robert notes that residents, are not only pleased with the low energy costs, but were actually most enthused by the shared garden and the feelings of well-being that stem from it being a beautiful spot.

 

In this podcast, Robert talks of his background and upbringing and how that has led him to his passion for living in harmony with nature.  He discusses how on his projects, and those of his colleagues, he always looks to introduce as many opportunities as possible for planting in designs, both internally and externally to reduce hard space and introduce a softer more natural element…. READ ON and LISTEN to the PODCAST

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Rebalance Earth - Enabling a world worth living in. Creating a Nature Positive Economy

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Rebalance Earth - Enabling a world worth living in. Creating a Nature Positive Economy

Robert Gardner is CEO and Co-Founder of Rebalance Earth. With over 20 years of experience in the financial industry, he has a unique expertise in sustainability, pensions, and wealth management and believes that money can be a force for good.

Rebalance Earth, is a fund manager that redirects the flow of private capital to protect and restore Nature.  Their mission is to drive the transition to a nature-based economy by enabling the flow of private capital to protect and restore nature. Rebalance Earth achieves this by creating opportunities for investors to achieve sustainable financial returns from projects to restore Nature.

Robert is passionate about the idea of “natural capital”.  He believes that investment in the environment shouldn’t simply be about climate change but should take a broader approach.  He sees a future in which biophilia is prominent and discussion of environment-conscious investment should include reduced biodiversity loss, rewilding, and all aspects of being in tune with nature.

Robert sees nature as the most valuable asset class on the planet. It provides everything from clean air to carbon capture and biodiversity; not forgetting that a balanced ecosystem is essential to create pollination and soil fertility for our food.

The investment community currently operates an extractive financial model that has been using all of nature's resources for free, not valuing them and, worse than that, destroying them.  Rebalance Earth is taking steps to build and propagate a more sustainable, biophilic approach.

In this podcast, Robert talks about how… READ ON and LISTEN to the PODCAST

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BIID Interior Design Award Winners - From Chapel Barn to Riverside

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BIID Interior Design Award Winners - From Chapel Barn to Riverside

The British Institute of Interior Design (BIID) is the only professional institute for interior designers in the UK. Our growing membership represents both the commercial and residential sectors, from heritage to cutting edge. In addition to rigorous entry requirements which assess training, experience and professionalism, they require our members to continue their professional development throughout their career to ensure their continued expertise in design process, practice and regulatory matters.

For those wishing to find an interior designer or to confirm the credibility of a potential interior designer they offer a directory of our Registered Interior Designers.

Each year BIID celebrates the very best of British interior design through its awards program.  The BIID Interior Design Awards showcase the best interior design projects completed across the UK.

Winners are awarded across 7 regional categories ranging from the largest commercial project to the smallest residential dwelling.  In addition, there are two landmark prices – the Interior of the Year Prize, which is awarded to the best interior design project in the UK and the Anna Whitehead Prize, which is awarded to the best achievement in sustainable interior design. 9 awards will be given out in total, along with acknowledgements of Highly Commended projects.

In this podcast, we are joined by two previous award winners and one of the judges of this year’s awards to discuss the value of the awards programme. Throughout the discussion it is clear that just adding sustainable materials to a design doesn’t make the overall design sustainable.  Consideration has to be given to materials being appropriate for the design; the design can’t simply include “box-ticking” elements.

The participants are all clear that a sustainable design doesn’t involve a compromise on aesthetics.  Indeed, taking a biophilic approach to design can enhance the look and feel of a space and contribute to a deeper, more meaningful aesthetic that resonates with the principles of balance with nature.

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Right Light, Right Place, Right Time

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Right Light, Right Place, Right Time

Steve Tonkin is the Dark Sky Advisor to Cranborne Chase National Landscape, in Wiltshire. Cranborne Chase is a designate Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty that, since 2019, has been recognised as an International Dark Sky Reserve.

Steve can pinpoint 4 October 1957 as the first became aware of dark skies. His family were, at the time, living 8 miles outside Bulawayo, Zimbabwe and his father took him outside to see if they could see Sputnik which had been launched the previous day. It was his first time looking up at a pristine dark sky and it triggered a life-long passion for astronomy which has made him aware of the effects of light pollution, and he has been raising the issue with anyone who will listen for the last 30 years.

After a first career as a telecommunications engineer, he did a BSc in Human Environmental Studies, then postgraduate work in technology policy, before training as a teacher. He taught physics, maths and astronomy in a variety of settings for 35 years, before retiring from teaching to concentrate on astronomy outreach activities. He has written several books on practical astronomy, has a monthly column in BBC Sky at Night Magazine, and is a regular speaker on astronomical topics.

Starting with a programme he made for BBC Radio Bristol in the 1980s, Steve has long been an advocate of reducing light pollution. He supported the Cranborne Chase’s International Dark Sky Reserve bid as a volunteer, taking sky quality readings and supporting the stargazing evenings by giving talks and showing people the night sky. His primary task as Dark Skies Advisor is to continue and consolidate the good work that has already been done and strengthen the Cranborne Chase’s standing as an International Dark Sky Reserve.

Light pollution is a global issue. The pollution itself is known to affect human health and wildlife behaviour and that is before considering the wasted energy involved in sending light upwards instead of downwards to where it is required. To take a Biophilic approach to the design of lighting is to reduce light pollution with direct and indirect benefits to nature… READ ON and LISTEN to the PODCAST…

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A task force for nature – where sustainability matters

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A task force for nature – where sustainability matters

Morgan Taylor leads the biodiversity side of Greengage, a multidisciplinary environmental consultancy who cover everything from energy and carbon assessments, sustainability, health, wellbeing, socio-economic assessment, and EIA management as well as the whole gamut of biodiversity assessment through to planning.

As designers, architects, or planners, we all need to be mindful of the impact our ideas, advice and decisions have on the world around us. We recorded this interview in the summer last year* Their work is focused outside of the legislative and planning policy sphere in the world of natural capital and ecosystem service value assessment. So rather than working with developers where they are only brought in because there is a potential impact on biodiversity in the first place, they're working with a lot of people with regards to asset management, land management, informing how financial capital is put towards recovery of natural capital across managed assets.

 We’ve got hundreds, maybe thousands of years of degradation and we need to take measures and understanding to address the impacts of our actions, and account for the significant loss of biodiversity particularly since the Industrial Revolution.

Morgan outlines all the different levels of legislation and planning policy that impact biodiversity in the built environment. He highlights three aspects of legislation and regulation that particularly drive positive change...

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“Bloom” - When Workspace Design meets Biophilia

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“Bloom” - When Workspace Design meets Biophilia

We speak with Marco Gastoldi, interior designer and Associate at Gensler, who in collaboration with some amazing partners have created the theme of the Workspace Design Show in London this year. The Theme is “Bloom”, and we speak in this podcast about the growing awareness of Biophilic Design, how it has environmental and psychological benefits, that it is based on science, neuroscience and also the many different ways of integrating nature in the built environment.

Marco celebrates the fact that Biophilic Design is important for us, that we have a primordial innate connection to nature, an instinct. This connection produces hormones that support feelings of belonging and collaboration which are crucial to performance and connection. Humans are biological organisms and Biophilic Design supports the mind body system in terms of health and wellbeing.

“Deep down we are aware that our connection to nature is vital. We forget that recreation is recreating and restoring ourselves. We spend 90% of our time indoors and there is so much data and evidence to prove that Biophilic Design is good in the workplace. For instance the Human Spaces report that proves Biophilic Design can improve productivity by 6% and creativity by 15%. We know that connection with nature, improves individual self-esteem and mood, the presence of water for example creates a relaxing and calming effect.”

Marco also talks about Ecological Balance Theory which refers to how we prefer nature resembling colours like green and blue, but not all natural environments are green, so it’s also important to tailor to local colour pallet and ecosystems – so it’s place based.

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Can the NHS embrace Biophilic Design?

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Can the NHS embrace Biophilic Design?

Dr Leighton Phillips Director of Research, Innovation and University Partnerships for the NHS Wales, Honorary Professor Aberystwyth University, and director on the Hywel Dda University Health Board joins us to share how they are bringing in Biophilic Design into healthcare in South West Wales. Part of his role is about questioning what we want the future to look like.

Dr Phillips shares with us how fundamentally important the natural environment is, how it profoundly influences our health and wellbeing. What he finds captivating about biophiilc design, is that there is an opportunity. “With over 1200 hospitals, and a million staff and nearly everyone in the UK having some interaction with the NHS services just imagine the health and planetary impact of the NHS embracing biophilic design.” ….

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The Walls are Alive! The Beauty of Greening our Cities - inside and out.

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The Walls are Alive! The Beauty of Greening our Cities - inside and out.

From designing a detailed picture of the New York Skyline in moss to how we need to design with biophilia to help mitigate climate change this great podcast with Lily Turner explores how we are just starting to realise the very real benefits that Living walls can bring to our cities, and our work and healing spaces.

 Lily Turner is an environmentalist, biophilic designer and living wall specialist. She's also the director of green walls at Urban Strong, the design-build maintenance firm offering services for green building technology solutions. In 2013, she co-founded Urban Blooms a non-profit to bring large-scale, publicly accessible living walls to dense urban environments. It was after Hurricane Katrina she was rebuilding homes, restoring landscapes, repairing drip irrigation systems and fields and got to do a lot of great community projects which inspired her to launch Urban Blooms, which aims to bring greenery back into the built environment to benefit people in the community.

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The Wave - Connecting us to our Blue Mind

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The Wave - Connecting us to our Blue Mind

Tying in with Issue 6, our Blue Mind edition of The Journal of Biophilic Design we speak with Nick Hounsfield, Founder and Chief Visionary Officer at The Wave in Bristol. The Wave is an inland Surfing destination.

After working in the healthcare sector and realizing that not only one of the key aspects for people was that they were lonely but that they also were missing a connection to nature, Nick wanted to create something at scale that would have a positive impact. He also wanted to reach out to people who didn’t have access to a private healthcare system.

“How can we democratise this? How can we make it more accessible for more people?” Nick explains how he went on to create The Wave. He had a very clear purpose and mandate, wanting to appeal to everyone, be accessible in all seasons and ensuring he addressed barriers to accessing to green and blue space. “We have to break down those barriers through design, through great landscaping, a good business model, and also make sure that we're not destroying the planet and local ecology either.”

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Skogluft – Forest Air. Reconnecting people to nature

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Skogluft – Forest Air. Reconnecting people to nature

We speak with Morten Kvam, CEO of Skogluft. Not only does it sound beautiful and uplifting, in Norwegian it means “Forest Air”. We talk about how plants are essential to have in the built environment and how the main founder of Skogluft Bjorn Virumdal was a mechanical engineer and realised that biological models were needed to explain the effects of nature indoors. NASA had conducted some research on how astronauts would be affected by the lack of nature. After speaking with them to explore their findings Bjorn then conducted further scientific research to prove how different plants and different light affected people in different working environments.

His research looked at three main aspects: the feeling of being awake, headaches and respiratory problems and he took readings before and after the intervention.

The results showed the positive effects of having nature indoors. Tiredness reduced by 40%, headaches reduced by 35% and concentration problems reduced by 16%. Morten tells us that they have over 7.2kg worth of evidence that nature indoors is good for us!

We also talk about the importance of light. The positive effect of light reflecting on nature. “We are programmed to stay in nature, we have always been surrounded by plants and light together,” Morten says. “It makes people react more positively when we see light reflected on plants.”

In his magic brush of biophilia, he says we should be looking to install nature everywhere, and “just like toilets are compulsory in buildings so should nature be compulsory indoors everywhere.” I think I’ll be sharing that last thought many many times. It’s straightforward and simple to grasp - nature should indeed be compulsory in every building.

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Building with Nature

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Building with Nature

Are you an agent for change? What is the barrier to designing better? Sometimes it is the apparent complexity of legislation governing ecology, planning and design that prevents people from discovering the best way of doing something. Fortunately, there is a simple award scheme that helps developers, builders, planners and designers navigate the myriad of paperwork and advisory bodies.

We speak with Dr Gemma Jerome, Director of Building with Nature, which helps define what good looks like in terms of green infrastructure (the way planners talk about nature). What I particularly love about Building with Nature is that it also helps give nature a seat around the table, especially at the beginning of the planning process and helps nature become a specification driver in planning and development. Building with Nature has an open-source Standards Framework, a one-stop-shop for all sectorial knowledge and expertise including Nature recovery, Sustainable water management through nature-based solutions, wellbeing, access and inclusivity to open and green spaces.

We talk about how planners and designers can use the Building with Nature Award Scheme as an external verification to tell the story of what they’ve done, to share learning, and to reassure key stakeholders who want better outcomes for people and wildlife. For instance, if you need to reassure communities that the developer has thought about all these things, or the local authority needs external verification, or investors need assurance. The Award Scheme is measurable and so offers this metric-based assurance to help you demonstrate to stakeholders you are planning and designing with the goal of reaching net zero, supporting nature recovery, as well as supporting people’s health and wellbeing 

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Sensory Reactivity

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Sensory Reactivity

When we design spaces, we need to consider how beautiful a place looks, how useful it is, is it fit for function and so on. We should also consider how the sensory elements of the space also stack up. In other podcasts and also in the Journal itself, we look at how our senses are impacted by sound, light, smell, even the haptic elements (those things we touch), smell (is the air fresh and clear) and many other things. All of us are affected by the impact our environment has on our senses, some of us more than others.

In this episode, we speak with Dr Keren MacLennan, Assistant Professor in Neurodiversity in the Department of Psychology, Durham University. Her research focuses on understanding how autistic people’s sensory processing differences relate to their mental health and experiences of different environments. She is co-producing research to support mental wellbeing to make environments more enabling for autistic individuals

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Making a Difference, One Roof at a Time

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Making a Difference, One Roof at a Time

Did you know that London is an average of 10 degrees warmer than other cities in the UK? Imagine if we had green roofs on every building in the city, the temperature of our city would reduce and lessen our impact on our fragile planet. Sedum absorbs the heat, it doesn’t bounce the heat back into the atmosphere. The plants are also air purifying, afford insulation, they help mitigate flood risk, encourage biodiversity, reduce air pollution and the urban heat island effect and also prolong the lifespan of the roof covering. One amazing fact I learnt today, was that they also increase the efficiency of solar panels, with a 5% gain as they stop the UV rays hitting and damaging the roof. Liv Eyres from Sedum Green Roof who will also be at Planted Country 9-11 June 2023 at Stourhead in Wiltshire, shares with us why they make for good habitats for biodiversity and so much more. Liv Eyres from Sedum Green Roof who will also be at Planted Country 9-11 June 2023 at Stourhead in Wiltshire, shares with us why they make for good habitats for biodiversity and so much more.  

A sedum roof is essentially an additional layer on top of a finished waterproof roof. Little plants nestle in a tray, sitting in healthy (peat-free!) soil, on top of filter fleece and a drainage layer.

Read on, listen to the podcast and watch the DEMONSTRATION video too…

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Town Planners as Doctors for Mother Earth – Garden Cities for the 21st Century

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Town Planners as Doctors for Mother Earth – Garden Cities for the 21st Century

It seems that in the 21st century we have even more challenges, from tackling climate change and biodiversity decline to an ageing population. Dr Wei Yang, influential thought-leader and a powerful advocate for climate action and nature-based solutions, advocates a people centric approach to community and environment. It is fundamental to create a balanced system for people, nature and society to exist in harmony. When we are dealing with so many different complex issues, we need to take a simple approach, with the main focus being that without nature we cannot survive. We need a mindset change when it comes to civic planning especially.

 

As human beings we have taken from nature and not given back to nature, and Dr Yang argues, as the Garden City Principle celebrates, we are missing a trick. There is a misunderstanding of garden cities. When we say “garden cities” people think, lots of trees. But it is a sophisticated, yet simple, social economic model. Using a land value capture model. Through development the land value increases and that can be captured providing social economic support to the community.

 

Dr Yang discusses how state run Social welfare can be a very top down approach and not necessarily what the community needs and there is a frustration in general with the Town Planning profession. Dr Yang opens our eyes to the fact that planning is in fact multi-disciplinary, not only is it an applied science discipline but it is also an art discipline. This highly sophisticated profession cuts across so many different disciplines, but, she argues, we need to ensure we maintain compassion and selflessness when we are planning our towns and cities. In fact, town Planners should be Doctors for Mother Earth

Read on and listen…

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Reconnecting with nature will save our society

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Reconnecting with nature will save our society

Sustainability matters, it is a matter of survival. For Carlo Battisti, President at Living Future Europe this is essential. We cannot design or build without considering this.

We already know the solutions, we need to implement them.

Carlo co-founded the Biophilic Society and coordinates LFE biophilic design strategy. “There are so many global issues to solve, our responsibility must start from the built environment, we know that 40% of emissions come from built environment and these have an impact on global issues.”

Each time we build, we start from scratch which means it’s difficult to standardise the processes, also the sector is so slow to change, but the built environment shapes the way we are living.

Carlo tells us about his experience and also about the Living Building challenge framework which was developed in 2006. We are now at the 4th version of the standard which was published in 2019. Biophilic Design has always been a core part of this framework. If we design and build with a better connection to nature, using natural light, better airflow, etc, there will be better energy consumption, greater energy efficiency. Also of course, there are lots of studies which show that bringing sufficient daylight into enclosed spaces, for instance in schools or hospitals, patients recover quicker, students learn faster in classrooms. There is such interesting and robust data.

The Biophilic Summit is taking place on 7th June 2023. The details of the summit programme and how to register can be found here: https://lfeurope.regfox.com/biophilia-summit-2023

Read on…

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The River of Life – Orientate Earth, Built Environment and Sustainable Workplace

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The River of Life – Orientate Earth, Built Environment and Sustainable Workplace

Harvesting the energy of our people, is a key message in this great podcast with Jaime Blakeley-Glover, founder of Orientate.earth and a collaborator with other businesses all working towards the same goal, to make our world and our environment a better place to live and thrive.

 We talk about his the “Social benefit of buildings”. For Jaime, we have a huge responsibility in relation to how we create our built environment, the decisions we take will have an effect for years after we’ve gone. We leave a legacy, and a choice. Do we create amazing awe-inspiring connected places or create dull and lifeless ones?

It is only by understanding and engaging with all the stakeholders, from the building owners to the people who work, visit, use and supply the buildings that will allow us to think about the place our buildings and places have in responding to the needs of people now and in the future. We need to broaden out how we think of things.

Buildings are more than just Units and assets, these are places where people live, how we build and design affects their lives and wellbeing. Let’s look at the Social-economic indicators as well as the “warm” data, this collective imagination to assess this broad set of information, and then respond to it.

Biophilic design and nature-inspired design does support a more sustainable way of living. It is proven, that if we care about something we do more to protect it, if we bring nature more into our sense of view, we will do more to protect it. We can also be inspired by nature and look at how buildings and cities are living systems.

We are part of the living system, in terms of cities, and nature.

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New Natural History GCSE – so we are not the Last Page of the Book of Earth

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New Natural History GCSE – so we are not the Last Page of the Book of Earth

With such a depletion of wildlife in the UK alone, with so many schools, cities, towns, and housing estates being built so far removed from our natural world how on earth does the next generation stand a chance to learn about the natural world and be sympathetic to it?

 At the same time, we also are demanding literally the earth from our natural world, and the way we extract from the natural world is getting more intensive and damaging.  As we move further away from it how do we fill that nature gap in society? We speak with Environmentalist, Producer and Writer Mary Colwell who has campaigned and devised a NEW Natural History GCSE designed to help bridge this chasm, helping put nature and the wonderment and fascination of nature into education.

“Nature is for everyone, it is there for YOU to engage with, that’s why putting it into the school system is important, making it open access and free to all, for everyone to engage with. We know from the COPs recently that we are looking at a very difficult time ahead, and those young people will have to live in this difficult time, and if they are going to make the right decisions for themselves, people and the planet, they need to be more knowledgeable, more engaged and more connected to this planet we live on.”

 Read and Listen on…

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Nature on Film - From David Attenborough and the BBC to Termite Mounds!

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Nature on Film - From David Attenborough and the BBC to Termite Mounds!

Biophilia is more than plants, light and air, it’s also about surrounding ourselves with living beings and our living natural world. If we think about it, E.O.Wilson’s seminal book, Biophilia celebrates all aspects of our living planet and is a call for that direct connection with nature. Wilson’s book examines our inherent connection to living species, the fascination of life, and how other living societal systems can inform our own. In fact, his lifelong interest in ant colonies emphasises this. Creating those moments of intimacy with nature has a really important place in our modern world where there is a disconnect with getting out there.

In this wonderful podcast, we speak with Michael Potts, who has spent more than 30 years as a wildlife cameraman, mostly for the BBC in more than 50 countries worldwide on major series including working alongside David Attenborough filming Life of Birds, The Life of Mammals and many programmes in the Natural World series. We discuss the importance of nature connection, biomimicry, why we need to introduce and educate the next generation, and also how audio-visual connection to nature through our TVs and devices is a positive thing and how we could take this one step further and introduce it into our built environment. “If you see something and understand it, then you care about it, then you might do something to protect it and encourage other people to do the same.” The messaging, inspiration and education you experience through wildlife films inspire people, and footage of birds in flight for instance has a calming effect as well.

Michael regales us with tales of animals, where he has filmed birds of paradise in New Guinea, Grizzly bears in Alaska, Termites in Namibia, Caribou migration, Polar Bears and more. He has spent many hours, up close and personal, feeling the heartbeat of a bird as it sits in his hand, feeling the strength of it, studying the intricacies of plumage which adapted to that way of life, their piercing eyes, incisive bills which continue to fascinate him: “every species is so special, they are all so different, so supremely adapted to where they live.”

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Feeling Alive

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Feeling Alive

As many of our listeners know, the concept of Biophilic Design brings our contact with nature closer into our lives in the built environment, whether that’s at home, work, hospitals, schools or our cities. In our podcasts we speak to people whose life’s work has been to design and work with nature and also to understand more deeply how and why our connection with nature is so profound and why it has a positive impact it has on us. The underlying factor is our inheritance from our ancestors, how for hundreds of thousands of years we lived outside, close to nature. We are still dependent on nature for our food, air, water, life.

In this podcast, we speak with Mary Reynolds Thompson, founder of Live Your Wild Soul Story, and who is an award-winning author, internationally recognized speaker, and a pioneer in the spiritual ecology movement, her focus is on the transformative power of landscape archetypes and nature metaphors to reveal our true purpose and right relationship with the planet. We discuss how the way we are living now alienates us from real life, from the living planet, from each other, and from our own authenticity. It’s not just a philosophy, it's proven that time in nature really heals you emotionally, psychologically, and physically, the effects are lasting – it has an accumulative benefit, extending into the stresses of the week. Therefore, simply put, the more connected we are to nature the happier we are.

“It’s an unfolding comfort, we feel the warmth or cold of the earth, almost like the heartbeat of the mother, security and happiness. For all of human history we lived outside, it’s part of our lineage, and we don’t just cut it off. We don’t lose that desire.” Mary goes on to describe a concept, Shadow wild – this disconnection which leaves such a gaping chasm that we tend to want to fill it with whatever is at hand because we want to feel alive (Joseph Campbell, the mythologist said – more than anything humans want to feel alive, and most of us feel alive when we are outside in the natural world.

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