Design based on nature – a literature investigation

This paper discusses the findings of a doctoral literature investigation considering design practice inspired by Nature into education. Academic and mainstream commercial publications related to Bio-design, Bionics, Biomimetics, Biomimicry and Nature Inspired Design form the basis of this investigation. Several approaches are compared and discussed to determine whether they are suitable for design education and capable of fostering sustainable design thinking. Current sustainable design education in the UK is explored to determine whether the identified current sustainable design methods are consistently embedded across the years of an undergraduate design degree or rather seen as an add-on to traditional design methods. The investigation concludes with 3 core questions that form the basis of further investigations. 1) Are design methods involving inspiration through nature used successfully in sustainable design education? 2) Could the integration of design based on nature lead to consistent inherently sustainable design practices. 3) Could this approach foster collaborative cross-discipline design projects at undergraduate level?