LCD Weekly Issue - 009 - LCD in Urban Environments
🏔️ Words from the mountains
People see us as designers in nature, living in our tiny Spanish Pyrenees surrounded by mountains, wildlife, and rural lands. And we are! However, there is a preconception that you can practice life-centered design only when you are in the great outdoors, which is not true. Nature is all around you; we are nature ourselves.
The principles and mindsets of life-centered design are just as relevant or even more relevant in an urban environment. Ultimately, life-centered design has to flourish and be nourished in cities because that is where designers can make the biggest impact. And most designers live in urbanized environments, not in a house in the middle of nowhere.
We must bring more nature and biodiversity into the city boundaries to live healthy in cities. For our more comprehensive mental health, we must start rethinking how we consume and outsource much of our lives. Some questions we should ask ourselves are:
Can we create opportunities to disconnect from the information overload of the urban environment?
How do we create a society with space for rewilding and living harmoniously with all life forms?
How can we design local circular or linear systems of the products and produce we consume that don't harm nature and society?
Can we create an urban environment that might breathe oxygen instead of exhaling C02?
How can we live in small communities in the city where reciprocity is the main economic driver?
I might ask some seemingly utopic design questions. As designers, we need to be naive and dream. The answers to these questions are to create future scenarios and strategies, systems, processes, products and services that aim to create livable cities for all with minimal environmental impact and inclusive communities.
We love this image by Jeroen Helmer for the Rewilding initiative.
🐅 LCD in the Wild - LCD For Urban Environments
In September 2023, we organized our first Life-Centered Design for Urban Environments at the George Brown College in Toronto, with Pivot Design Group, InformD and the Brookfield Sustainability Institute. We took on the Toronto Islands as our client and guiding voice. We are immersed in Mnisiing, the original name for the islands, as a significant place for the First Peoples of this territory and used by Indigenous peoples long before written history. We created several non-human personas and designed pathways forward that help visitors connect better to the place and ways to regenerate nature on the islands.
On the re-design.life website, you can listen to the islands' voices and discover more about this project.
🪄 Inspiration- Climify Podcast
In this Climify Podcast, our friend Eric Benson talks with Dr. Melinda Adams—Indigenous scholar, ecologist, and cultural fire practitioner—and explores how place-specific, Indigenous-led practices are the key to stewarding and restoring our shared lands. Dismantling the rhetoric of Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK), Adams teaches a more actionable approach to controlled burning—Humble Fire—that reframes fire as a "more-than-human relative," from which we must actively listen and learn. This "storytelling on the land" calls us to defer to Indigenous ways of being in our interventions and return to the land, assessing how our ancestors respond and applying what we learn to ensure our collective future.
🔥 Hot in the school- Course - Retreat - Free Webinar
🦋 LAST DAY TO ENROL!
Today is your final opportunity to enrol in our Fundamentals Course, "Shifting from Human to Life-Centered Design"! We have two fantastic groups, and we can hardly wait to begin. Currently, there are only two spots left. This is your sign to join us!
🏔️ Life-Centered Design Retreat
The Pyrenees are calling!
It sounds like a dream, right? Just imagine spending a whole week in the beautiful Spanish Pyrenees, surrounded by nature and learning about Life-Centered Design. And the best part? This dream can actually become a reality! We have spent almost a year creating the most unique experience for designers, an experience that has the potential to change the way you perceive and interact with the world. And we can confidently say that we have nailed it!
We only offer 5 spots, so this is an exclusive immersion you will never forget! Check all the details here.
FREE WEBINAR!
Have you ever wondered how to include nature in your design practice? Or even how do you give it a voice? Join us in exploring the transformative realm of life-centered design and Non-human personas. Join us Thursday, March 21st, from 12:00-1:00 PM CET. Sign up here.
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That’s all for this week! See you next Monday!
👋 Jeroen
