About
“Bouncing Ideas? What like rubber? Do they really bounce?”
Quote from my friend, when I told him the title of my blog.
About Me:
My name is Carl Hastrich. I teach at OCAD University in Toronto. I was a toy designer. I love ideas.
My personal design evolution continues to bounce back and forth between the contradictions of playful chaos and disciplined structure. The more time I spend immersed in the dialogues of innovation, sustainability and creativity, the more my world view is challenged. This blog is my own play space for sharing, shaping and committing these thoughts onto “paper”.
This blog is a small window into my curious exploration of the ever changing design landscape.
Carl Hastrich, in the wild, on a Eames Elephant drinking a lovely red.
About this Blog:
This blog is a new experience for me, as I begin to share these unfinished, half cooked ideas I am aware that some of the key ideas and posts are easily buried as I continue my brain purge onto the interwebs.
So… here are a couple of key ideas and posts that I want to make sure don’t get lost:
Biomimicry – it’s value, it’s vision and it’s application
I’ve spent over 6 years exploring biomimicry; as a teacher, designer, student and obsessor. Several key ideas are forming in my mind that I am realizing are critical to biomimicry:
- Biomimicry as a tool does not guarantee sustainability.
- Developing biomimicry as a strategic approach is an emerging discipline and needs a lot of work.
- Genius of Place is one of the concepts driving biomimicry towards strategic applications.
- The vision of what a biomimicry world would be, is unclear.
- In fact the visions of sustainability are unclear in general…
For anyone new to the world of biomimicry below are some critical online resources to get you started.
http://video.ted.com/assets/player/swf/EmbedPlayer.swf
Michael Pawlyn – Architect and Biomimicry Pioneer
http://video.ted.com/assets/player/swf/EmbedPlayer.swf
Janine Benyus – the Godmother of Biomimicry
http://video.ted.com/assets/player/swf/EmbedPlayer.swf
Robert Full – Biology and Engineering collaborator
i didn’t see your email so i’m leaving mine. i’m excited by the ideas you’re expressing and to start building the bridge between design + science.
melanie (mdecola@comcast.net | http://mdecola.home.comcast.net)
Hello Carl!
My name is Tink Stephenson and I studied biomimicry in Costa Rica with Karen and Carla. While not practicing biomimicry in a formal design sense, it continues to inform my work on a daily basis. In a couple of weeks time I am speaking at an event and would like to include my experience of biomimicry in that. On the off-chance that you have time for a skype meet-up in the next few weeks, it would be great to connect!
Tink
Dear Carl,
I am working on a solar powered boat in the Ecuadorian Amazon. I think biomimicry could help solve some of the seemingly intractable design problems we are facing. Please email me if you would be willing to share some ideas!
oliverutne@gmail.com
Many thanks,
Oliver
Hey Carl!
How are you doing? Recently stumbled on your blog and I like what I see, very informative entries!
Thank you for contributing so much to the biomimicry class, it was great having you as an instructor!
I have posted my final project from your class on my portfolio page, feel free to check it out:
http://issuu.com/andreychernykhportfolio/docs/biomimicry_2011_project_andrey_chernykh
Andrey.
Hey Andrey!
Thanks for posting your work – I’ll spend some time on it and make it a post: there’s a few things in there I want to discuss.
Hi Carl,
I am much interested to change the way we do research in biology and have come across design thinking in recent months and saw your blog just now. I would love to know what you think about how biologists (in my case molecular biologist) do research, and if there is scope for design approaches there. Thanks. Anisah
Carl
I am excited to see your toy design class! This is an area of great interest for me… I worked in the industry for about 5 years and am finishing up my graduate studies at IIT Institute of Design (Chicago). I am hesitant to jump back into the toy industry in its traditional sense, would be interested in chatting with you about the changes you made to the class, having a ‘broader’ look at play.
Collin
[...] Carl Hastrich was the reporter for the third discussion breakout group. He’s incorporated some of their conversation into his reflections on “Beginning to Learn Systems Thinking” particularly on “normal versus post-normal science” and “hard systems versus soft systems”. [...]
Hello Carl,
I stumbled across your blog in doing some research on biomimicry. My company GSMI will be holding our first biomimicry event Biomimicry World Summit and we’d love to reach out and see if you would be interested in working with the event.
You can reply to tom.dibble(at)gsmiweb.com and I hope to hear from you!
Hi Tom,
Thanks for reaching out – I sent an email but am concerned it might have ended up in the junk folder?
Hope to chat soon,
Carl