Chris Garvin is an accomplished practitioner and active voice in the sustainable design community with over twenty years experience. Chris was named a Partner in 2008 and Managing Partner in 2014 of Terrapin Bright Green.  His interests include high-performance design at both the building and community scale, zero energy communities, biomimicry, biophilia, and data analytics.

 

Utilizing whole-systems thinking to develop integrated design strategies, Terrapin Bright Green challenges design and ownership teams to create restorative, regenerative environments. They believe in finding solutions that reconnect people with nature and mimic natural systems as this focus offers boundless opportunities to improve the quality of life for all. They also believe that high performance design means fundamentally improving health and productivity, while improving overall economic and environmental performance.

 

Biophilic design can reduce stress, enhance creativity and clarity of thought, improve our well-being and expedite healing; as the world population continues to urbanize, these qualities are ever more important. Theorists, research scientists, and design practitioners have been working for decades to define aspects of nature that most impact our satisfaction with the built environment.

 

“14 Patterns of Biophilic Design” articulates the relationships between nature, human biology and the design of the built environment so that we may experience the human benefits of biophilia in our design applications.

Biophilia in Context looks at the evolution of biophilic design in architecture and planning and presents a framework for relating the human biological science and nature.