Nature Inspired Design is about designing products that make a positive impact on society and the environment, instead of products with a reduced negative impact, as is the case with traditional ecodesign. The idea is to emulate strategies used by living systems into technologies that are economically and ecologically successful. Two design strategies exist that have this goal: Cradle to Cradle and Biomimicry. Both receive much enthusiasm and sometimes even seem to be a hype. But are the resulting designs truly sustainable? How is Nature Inspired Design different from business-as-usual? And how can you apply NID in your daily design practice, and with which method? These are the main questions in the project Nature Inspired Design Method, a research project financed by the Netherlands Enterprise Agency. Running from 2012-2015 with a consortium of ten companies, a novel design method will be developed and tested that lets designers integrate Cradle to Cradle and Biomimicry in their daily design practice. Each of the companies counts as a leader in its field, with a proven track record on at least one of the two strategies, bringing in valuable insights and experience. The project results will be materialized in an easy-to-use handbook. It will combine the best practices of the ten companies, complemented with state-of-the-art design research and insights in the principles of sustainable living systems. These results will be presented at a symposium in Delft, The Netherlands on the 6th of November 2014. For more information on the project or the symposium, please contact the project leader, Dr.Ir. Erik Tempelman at e.tempelman@tudelft.nl or visit us at www.natureinspireddesign.nl

1. Swisstainability forum, Lausanne, June 5-6 2014
Ingrid de Pauw
PhD/postdoc
Bram v.d. Grinten and Ernst-Jan Mul
Action Researchers C2C / biomimicry
Erik Tempelman
Project leader

5. Overlap
Life Cycle thinking
Recycling
Efficiency
Safe materials
Renewable energy
Product-service systems

6. Differences
Ecodesign:
Biomimicry:
Cradle to cradle:
Circular Economy:
Ecodesign:
LifeCycle Analysis
Biomimicry:
Life's Principles
Cradle to cradle:
Three principles
Circular Economy:
Inner circles

7. Best practices
Top-down & troughout
Chemist & biologist
Focus: first phase
Ambitious target
Chain collaboration

8. NID method

9. NID method

10. NID method

11. NID process
team up
set goals
map contexts
get ideas
integrate solutions
test goals
start cycles
keep optimizing

12. NID process
team up
set goals
map contexts
get ideas
integrate solutions
test goals
start cycles
keep optimizing

13. Business
as usual

14. Business
Model canvas

15. Product
/ service

16. Cycles &
BenefitsBenefits

17. Cycles &
BenefitsBenefits

18. Cycles &
BenefitsBenefits

19. Cycles &
BenefitsBenefits

20. Biomimicry &
Cradle to cradle

21. Biomimicry &
Cradle to cradle

22. Biomimicry &
Cradle to cradle

23. Biomimicry &
Cradle to cradle

24. Biomimicry &
Cradle to cradle

26. Time

27. Time

28. Time

29. Team

30. Team

31. Team

32. Tools

33. Tools

34. Symposium TU Delft, November 6th
2014