Kaisa Mikkola joined our February Biophilic Society session sharing insights from her paper and work. A part-time landscape architect and adventurer with a passion for wildness and rewilding, in designing for outdoor recreation and climate resilience. Kai lives a Scottish nomadic off-grid camper van life, from where she joined us.
I’m really inspired by biodiverse and nourishing spaces where both people and wildlife thrive, being in a different place every night and then just opening my door, seeing different inspiring places, talking to others, visiting a lot of rewilding projects in Scotland and seeing how the landscape could look like in the future
Kai wrote her wilderness paper inspired by travelling around Scotland’s two national parks and hiking long-distance routes with battered copies of John Muir’s My first summer in the Sierra & George Monbiot’s Feral in her backpack.
Kai encourages us to imagine a wild place, to “take yourself there, where is it, what does it look like, and how does it feel to be there?”
Concepts and our relationship with the wild have evolved. Kai took us on a journey from the 17th century when wild was viewed as scary and unproductive to be tamed and cultivated. To the 18th-century Romanticism movement feeling of sublime, overwhelming terror and excitement, and the 19th-century American wilderness as a nationalist symbol, a sacred place where one could meet God. In the 21st century, “wilderness” is seen as self-willed, not controlled by humans and the emergence of wildness and rewilding, in creating wild places to restore animals and plants.
Following Kai’s talk a vibrant conversation covered whether Biophilic Design and Landscaping should be messy or manicured and how the indigenous narrative on wilderness shapes our understanding of biophilia.
How you see the land is influenced by knowledge that you have about ecology, people, writings read, the stuff you bring with you, and the history behind words like ‘wildness’. Looking at a landscape, it’s already layered with memories, other people’s writings and opinions, what you think it should look like, what you think it shouldn’t look like, and whether it’s good or bad.
Connect with Kai on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/her_endless_roadtrip/
And on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kaisa-mikkola/.
Join the Biophilic Society by signing the Manifesto
Next meeting is on Monday 27th March, 5-6 PM CEST, featuring:
Leen Gorissen
Innovation Biologist & Transition Expert, Studio Transitio
Leen Gorissen, Ph.D. in Biology, is specialized in ecology, transition science, regenerative development and bio-inspired innovation. She is the author of the recent book ‘Building the Future of Innovation on millions of years of Natural Intelligence’ and the founder of Centre4NI, a catalyst that helps organizations and businesses to innovate like nature. She has worked for a broad range of clients and organized bio-inspired innovation sessions in cities across the world. From 2009-2017, Leen worked as a Transition Research Coordinator at the Flemish Institute for Technological Research (VITO Belgium) www.studiotransitio.
Submit your abstract for the first Biophilia Summit (June 7th 2023), applications deadline is March 31st.
Further information: biophilicsociety@living-future.eu
