ANDRZEJ KRAUZEFrank Lloyd Wright, the most famous espouser of “organic architecture” (and the one who made the term common parlance), wrote that ideal design results in “a sentient, rational building that would owe its ‘style’ to the integrity with which it was individually fashioned to serve its particular purpose.”
Organic architecture usually results in something curvy and sinuous. Most architects inspired by biology base their work on multicellular organisms, such as an orchid or a cactus, for example. Some employ biomimicry in their blueprints, taking lessons from termite nests to cool a building naturally and efficiently or from the honeycombs of bees to produce structural strength. There is even a building whose design is inspired by living cells and their multitude of organelles: the future home of the Institute for Nanobiomedical Technology and Membrane Biology in Chengdu, China.
While Wright had actual building design in mind when he spoke of organic architecture, he no doubt would have been fascinated to learn that cells have been engaging in the practice for billions of years. In ...
