In the past few decades, biophilic design has been on the rise among high-rise buildings. This may sound like a niche architectural trend, but it seems to be something more significant, with implications for American urban life that go beyond just being eco-aware and attractive to look at. This is a transformation of lifestyle, a remake of the experience of urban environments, and certainly in places like New York City, which can feel overwhelmingly vertical and dense. Biophilia is the idea that humans have an instinct to connect with nature and other forms of life. Whether or not we realize it, we are hardwired to find bonds outside of ourselves in ways that are healthy and meaningful and help us feel relaxed and at ease.
The authority of the architecture world has noticed this, and it seems to be playing with the idea of biophilia as a trend, a fad, or a nonsense architectural theory that doesn’t really mean anything when it comes to space-making and the making of place.
Biophilic high-rise buildings can allure us with their seamless integration of nature into the vertical plane. Skyscrapers become living ecosystems, with not only greenery but plant life interacting with the surroundings. Whole micro-forests can thrive on various levels of high-rises, hugging the contours of homes that nosh upward. Balconies already give way to overhanging porch spaces. They and rooftop sanctuaries can spill forth big, little, and world-class (if not in height, certainly in density) tree canopies. With these high-rises, nature is not added to but welcomed into the warm body of vertical living, which is enhanced with plank pathways, steps, and shady alcoves; these canopies buzz with life from soon-to-be blooming honeysuckle shrubs and other biodiversity that leads us to think of these gorgeous buildings not merely as humane expressions of the artist’s architecture but also as profoundly green structures.
These structures do more than just provide residents with a glimpse of greenery during their urban experience; they embody a commitment to bringing nature into the built environment. But is this a new aesthetic? While proponents of biophilic design might argue that the beauty of these structures lies in their lushness, the elevated health of the humans living in and around these buildings should be the real indicator of their success. After all, high-rise biophilia isn’t just about looks; it’s about creating a more livable, nourishing urban experience.
One Central Park, in Sydney, is the biophilic high-rise that often gets the most press. In large part, this is due to its unique “living wall” feature, in which the vertical garden plants are nourished through a system that exposes their roots to sunlight, an unprecedented use of horticultural “heliostats.”
This anecdotal evidence is not just hearsay; it is supported by research. Studies have demonstrated that access to greenery can significantly reduce stress, lower blood pressure, and enhance cognitive function. It seems almost magical—as if it were somehow unfairly privileged—to be able to gaze out the window at trees, even from 40 stories up. It might sound far-fetched, but what I’m trying to get at here is kind of the crux of E.O. Wilson’s biophilic hypothesis: “We’re supposed to be able to see trees from our windows.” Clearly, plant life can and should be incorporated into the design of high-rises; we’ll get to why that is in a minute.
But first, let me attempt to construct for you a “biophilic narrative.” From listener to leaf, from tree to wing.
A particularly impressive example is the Parkroyal Collection Pickering hotel in Singapore. This structure features an incredible 15,000 square meters of greenery, which is more than 200% of the land area on which the building sits. Its relationship with the plants is symbiotic: a sophisticated irrigation and rainwater harvesting system creates a thriving environment for the plants, while the hotel inhabitants benefit from the biophilic building’s cooler temperatures, better air quality, and, generally speaking, a tranquil atmosphere. Although these biophilic buildings are green in appearance, they are also green at heart. Built with a number of sustainable design features, their glorious gardens are just one element of an environment that mercifully skirts the realm of sustainability.
For example, rainwater recycling systems, solar panels, and energy-efficient designs make up a significant portion of the biophilic building’s framework.
Building biophilic high-rise buildings is not without its challenges, and the main obstacle is probably maintenance. Living plants need looking after, and the higher they are, the more difficult this becomes. Some developers don’t even want to think about biophilic design because they are concerned about the costs and logistics associated with maintaining vertical gardens or living roofs. And frankly, living in a biophilic high-rise isn’t as simple as planting a tree in a park. I’ve seen one too many projects where vertical gardens were installed with the best intentions, only to result in withering plants, failed irrigation systems, and a vision that never came close to reality.
It is therefore vital for architects and developers to think about the long-term sustainability of their designs. One of the most effective techniques I have come across is the installation of intelligent irrigation systems that use sensors to keep track of how wet (or dry) soil is and that control when and how much water is applied to the plants. This not only conserves water, but also guarantees that the plant life included in a project will endure and thrive.
Another difficulty is guaranteeing that these structures stay open to the public and that they do not become the domain of only the few wealthy enough to live in such innovative spaces. I think the idea should be that nature is not a luxury. Biophilic high-rises are marketed as premium properties; however, it’s imperative that cities figure out a way to also engender these same principles in affordable housing.
What High-Rise Biophilia Might Look Like in the Future
I am very hopeful about the future of biophilic design in high-rises. I see technological evolution making it easier, not harder, to integrate natural elements into our built environments in ways that are both beautiful and functional. Green building certifications like LEED and WELL, which reward health and sustainability, are pushing developers toward biophilic design.
I can envision a time in the not-so-distant future when high-rises that reflect biophilic design are a common sight instead of a rarity. Already, recent developments in places like Singapore, which mandates the inclusion of nature in new construction, suggest that it’s possible to create buildings and environments in our cities that embrace our fundamental human need for nature and, thanks to the latest virtual reality technologies, we’re now able to immerse ourselves in biophilic environments. So my question is, what might this look like in a place like New York or Tokyo?
As we relentlessly advance architecture and urban design, I see biophilic skyscrapers as urban structures essential to our creation of not only livable but also prosperous cities. They stand as a model for a reintegration with nature that seems almost a prerequisite for anything like a thriving urban existence. Given our astonishing urbanization and densification, and taking into account our ever-widening disconnection from nature, it is hard to overstate the significance of biophilic high-rises.
The final segment of the program instructs a code block to perform the task of creating a text output. This task requires the code block to print to standard output the single word “complete.”
Part 2: An In-Depth Exploration of Biophilic High-Rise Ideas and Innovations
The concept of biophilic design in skyscrapers reshapes the relationship between humans and the urban environment. It offers the promise of making these monolithic structures immersive experiences that exhibit the kind of vitality one would expect from a living, breathing ecosystem. Biophilic design tries to go beyond mere ecology, even eschewing some of the commonplace methods that today’s “green” structures use to achieve energy savings and to employ those often-unseen mechanisms that make nature great. In what follows, we will take a look at some particular cases, and we’ll witness some remarkable innovations that serve as a compelling argument for not just the future of new skyscrapers, but also the very possibility of revitalizing cities by transforming their existing typologies.
From Urban Canyons to Urban Jungles: The Changing Faces of the Transformative Spaces in Our Cities
In the initial phase of biophilic high-rise constructs, greenery was in many cases limited to ornamental plants or gardens at the tops of buildings. These were not without their merit, but they hardly constituted living architecture in any real sense. Now, these vertical communities of plants, animals, and even microorganisms are rising mere feet from our heads in the offices and apartments of high-rise cities.
One endeavor that particularly captures my attention is the Oasia Hotel Downtown in Singapore. Strolling around the building, you feel as though you’ve uncovered an accidental urban jungle—a 27-story tower swathed in a red metal lattice that supports over 21 varieties of climbing plants. As you go up the building, the vegetation thickens, creating a rich environment that naturally cools the structure while amplifying biodiversity. When I made my way over to it, I could definitely tell the difference in temperature between the busy street life right below and the nearly zen upper floors, thanks to the greening effect.
In a metropolis where every inch counts, designs like Oasia’s stand apart. They’re not just about greenery in the building; they make the building itself a sort of green plant. The Oasias stand in stark contrast to what some have called “Manhattanization”—the imposition of dense, rigid forms into the West’s more gentle topography. Instead of fighting against the climate and the local ecosystem, Oasia’s design harmonizes with it. I see this as a critical lesson for future developments—rather than imposing rigid architectural forms on the environment, we should aim to create buildings that enhance their surroundings.
Living Inside and Out: Integrating Nature Everywhere
I’m also fired up over the rising concentration on inclusive, scalable, and reproducible designs for high rises. Whether to a low rise like a green space in the backyard, or to a high rise like a rooftop garden, our urban structures can and should extend their embrace of nature vertically. A siting strategy that incorporates maximizing both ground-level and rooftop access to nature, as well as the elevation in between, is vital to creating the next generation of healthy buildings.
A prime illustration of this concept is 25 King Street in Brisbane, Australia. This structure is the tallest engineered timber office building in the country. While timber provides a natural, biophilic element, the building incorporates outdoor terraces on every level. These terraces are like balconies that project from the façade. They are lushly landscaped. Employees have spaces to relax, socialize, or even work outdoors while surrounded by greenery. This connection to nature fosters a well-being that is often missing from more conventional high-rise office building environments.
Projects such as 25 King Street really drive home the importance of outdoor space in residential towers, particularly in densely populated urban centers. It’s all too common to attribute some sort of failure to nature-starved high-rise living when we turn on the news and see footage of protesters, armed or not, barricaded inside a lushly landscaped greenhouse. But the reality is, high-rises do not inherently lack sufficient contact with nature.
Biodiversity as a Fundamental Element of Design
Although there is plenty of evidence to suggest that biophilic high-rises benefit people, what may be even more critical is their potential to support urban biodiversity. By stacking nature upward, biophilic high-rises create space for a surprising number of species in a part of the city that is otherwise mostly hardscape, from the ground to the highest plateaus in the canopy.
The Planted Tower in Lausanne, Switzerland, perfectly represents this idea. Currently still in development, the high-rise is planned to support biodiversity through an innovative application of plant life and green spaces. Unlike many contemporary buildings that pay mere lip service to greenery, the designers of the Planted Tower have chosen a stunning range of native plant species that themselves support a truly astonishing range of wildlife. Their choice of plants is certainly not a design-afterthought; it’s the building’s defining characteristic. Of course, wildlife is only one part of the puzzle; how can the occupants of the tower live in harmony with the environment?
Urban biodiversity is not just for bees, butterflies, and foxes—studies show that human inhabitants benefit mightily from biophilic designs, too.
Integrating Cutting-Edge Technology One of the most thrilling developments in biophilic high-rise design is the integration of smart technologies that make buildings not just stunning and healthy but also efficient. Traditional buildings consume vast amounts of energy and resources. Biophilic high-rises can be designed to work with the natural systems around them, reducing their environmental impact and enhancing the comfort of their occupants.
One Central Park in Sydney is an obvious example of many biophilic components integrated with state-of-the-art technology that allows it to thrive as a “green” building. “We can’t be a lazy eco-architect and just apply the following principles: It’s very good to have light in this space. It’s also good to have plants and ‘natural’ materials around, but it’s not enough!” truly says architect and co-designer of the award-winning design Paul E. Hutton.
In addition, the biophilic high-rises have hundreds of thousands of square feet of greenery throughout their vertical spaces. Even the roofs have vegetation for aesthetic and habitat creation. This brings nature right into the living spaces of the buildings, not just in the spaces outside, adjoining the buildings, which is what most green architecture does. To put in context the amount of nature the Shimao Wonderland has, I’ll say this: The building has, when all is said and done, five times the amount of nature that is in the 1,016-foot-tall One World Trade Center in New York City, which has a gross area of 3.5 million square feet as per the most generous definition from the people behind that building.
Yet, in terms of pure spatial volume, not a single high-rise could encase what is inside the Shimao Wonderland Cave.
Picture a metropolis where every tall building connects with nature—from rooftop gardens to vertical forests—in the way the streets are already shaded by trees and not just towers. With this kind of biophilic high-rise, urban wildlife would thrive, and the city’s human inhabitants would enjoy increased well-being in all kinds of hard-to-quantify ways that all add up to a significant enhancement in the quality of life for anyone who lives or works in a high-rise. Corridor biomes connecting one neighborhood and the next, marine life flourishing in an aquatic high-rise in the kind of freshwater sea you can make indoors, snakes slithering their way up and down the trees and shrubs in the stairwells of biophilic towers—this is not just a visionary pipedream.
Creating living architecture is just the beginning; this art is most potent when it redefines our urban existence and re-establishes an organic relationship with the environment for all city dwellers. The kind of biophilic housing we’re talking about must also be affordable; if not, the privileged only will enjoy its benefits, and that is not right in a country that professes to value equality. It makes little sense for architects and designers to create sustainable worlds accessible only to the wealthy; biophilic design must work its way down to the masses. And yet, as we look across the urban landscape today, many of the world’s leading cities brim with biophilic high-rises and living buildings of all sorts.
Twisting and curving their way toward the sky, they not only house humans and facilitate human work; they house and serve human and nonhuman nature alike and do so sustainably.
These edifices transcend mere height; they stand as symbols of a more sustainable, viable future. If more cities adopt this emblematic design, we may see a dramatic shift in our perception of urban life. In the next section, I will debate the pros and cons of biophilic design in high-rise buildings.
Biophilic high-rises are proverbial swans—so beautiful and contemporary that no one wishes to challenge them. Aesthetic considerations aside, however, they present significant obstacles both in their design and in the culture surrounding them. High-rises are fundamentally vertical spaces. “Verticality is about going up,” says University of Maryland architecture professor and Sustainability Research Lab director Louis A. Timilty. “Five might be down.” Biophilic design, by contrast, is fundamentally about space that connects you to nature—down, up, or sideways—in a functional and aesthetically pleasing way.
The financial case for biophilic high-rise projects is one of the most pressing questions posed by developers—for good reason. Integrating biophilic design means adding elements like vegetation, water features, and natural materials to high-rise buildings. These elements must be paid for both during construction and after that, when the building is in use. And in a world where investors want to see returns on their projects, biophilic high-rises must pay off—something investors might have trouble imagining. When we look at the long-term benefits, however, the payoff starts to make sense.
An important point to make is that these buildings bring added value to the city’s real estate market. Studies have shown that properties next to parks or integrated natural features have higher market values and rental rates than others. This isn’t a huge mystery; as our places get more packed and our nature deficit more pronounced, people are always gonna pay a lot for a little slice of natural beauty. And you can bet that the Biophilic High-Rise is gonna be a rentable, sellable proposition.
Let’s think about 181 Fremont, a luxury skyscraper in San Francisco known for its environmentally friendly design. The green spaces it boasts make it something of a biophilic building—a term used to describe structures that integrate with the natural world. Living in a space like this, one might reasonably assume, brings a certain kind of bliss, what with all the views of nature both real (the building tops out at over 700 feet) and simulated (the green walls and terraced gardens). And you might also guess that this feeling of bliss has something to do with why 181 Fremont’s tenants pay such high rents.
The building’s tenants are mostly tech workers, but it has also been home to celebrities.
Potential operational cost savings is another big reason to consider biophilic high-rises. Although these buildings need a bigger upfront investment, their long-term energy savings often more than make up for that difference. Most of the time, biophilic high-rises are energy-efficient in their operation. That’s because many of their features (such as “green” walls and cooling roofs) naturally insulate the buildings, so they’re much less reliant on power-hogging HVAC systems. In hot climates, these high-rises need much less mechanical cooling (if any) because the plants do most of the work. Conversely, in cool weather, the natural insulation means that they’re much less likely to lose heat; that’s the cells and windproofer-style coats in the Accordion Effect.
The enduring economic returns that biophilic high-rises produce create a compelling argument for why planners and developers should make these structures the standard for urban living. Why? Because the return on investment for biophilic buildings—both in operational efficiency and in return on property value—is significant, and biophilic structures have been shown to produce increasingly pronounced benefits that compound over time.
Breaking through barriers to broad acceptance
Even though biophilic high-rises can be beneficial, a frequent challenge that my colleagues and I face when promoting them is the perception that they are too difficult to integrate into our existing urban forms. Most of our cities are laid out in neat, rigid grids. When these grids were laid down, they were interpreted as freedom for the very streets and structures that lined them. In fact, our urban frameworks often insist on a pseudo-freedom that is really just a nihilistic “no” to anything that could be interpreted as refusing the grid.
The obstacle of biophilic design not being achievable in existing buildings can be overcome in a variety of ways. It can be done by applying biophilic principles, adding biophilic design elements, or simply achieving some of the design intents of biophilic design, which is not the same as docking a full design paradigm on high-rises. The ways of getting to compulsory biophilia in existing buildings are a lot more than what could be covered in this chapter. Nevertheless, here are a few of them.
I recall the Greenpoint Landing project in Brooklyn, which took the aging buildings of a former industrial waterfront and transformed them into something remarkably fresh and contemporary, thanks to the biophilic design elements it incorporated—namely, the green roofs with abundant plant life and the green, plant-filled courtyards. Here was one possible answer to the question of how urban places can integrate biophilic design.
The regulatory frameworks in many cities present another possible obstacle to the adoption of biophilic high-rises. Zoning laws, building codes, and even aesthetic guidelines can sometimes impede innovation. For instance, in some cities, the addition of living walls or rooftop gardens doesn’t comply with existing regulations, which makes it hard for developers to get projects like that approved.
I remain hopeful that the compensation frameworks will, over time, catch up to the better design solutions being offered. It will take some doing, however. For one thing, spatial poverty (inadequate amounts of the right kind of space to live and work in) is a problem in many U.S. cities, especially those on the East Coast. Spatial justice can only be served if architectural squalor is eradicated. Following the lead of Singapore, a number of U.S. cities—from New York to San Francisco—are requiring that new construction projects incorporate green building elements. But none of them (as of this writing) has mandated the biophilic high-rise as part of their models for a more sustainable future.
So, for something as innovative as biophilic design to “go mainstream” will likely take both time—and some law-making.
How Architects and Urban Planners Influence Change
In the push towards biophilic high-rises, developers and city officials play important but rather conventional roles. The real change that is happening and that can happen in the future is being driven by architects and urban planners. With their special training and knowledge, they are the ones best able to envision buildings that unite the natural and built environments in ways that are not clearly evident in today’s Manhattan skyline, save maybe for the One World Trade Center, whose design certainly seems to arise more from a vision of nature than from a traditional idea of street-level urbanity.
An architect who consistently inspires me in my discipline is Stefano Boeri, the intellectual force behind Milan’s Bosco Verticale. Boeri’s work highlights the biophilic principle that a building doesn’t have to be “green” in a superficial way, such as with green walls and roofs. Rather, by taking a tree as a model, an architect can make a biophilic building by designing a structure that performs not only for the humans inside but also for the greater ecosystem to which it belongs and by thinking about local conditions (like biodiversity) and health impacts in a way that pushes buildings toward truly “vertical forest” territory.
Thus, one takeaway from Boeri’s work is that architects can and should be leaders in the push for more sustainable, biophilic urban environments.
City planners matter, too. They occupy a pivotal position in determining the overall vision of the city. They control the not-insignificant decisions of where and how tall structures should be built. When planners prioritize biophilic principles, they yield an environment that is not just more beautiful and more amenable to its inhabitants but is also more resilient to the rigors of climate change.
I have observed this sort of progressive planning in cities like Copenhagen, which have a reputation for committing to sustainable urban design. The city has made a deliberate effort to ensure that every new development—be it a park, a green roof, or a canal designed to alleviate flooding—incorporates nature and serves the public. This sort of entity-by-entity planning, which is necessary to realize a true biophilic city, is something we ought to look to as we strive to make biophilic high-rises a part of a sustainable, resilient urban future.
The Importance of Biophilic Design: Why It Is More Necessary Than Ever for Human Beings
Ultimately, the triumph of biophilic skyscrapers is tied to how humans experience them. More and more, we know how detrimental urban living can be for mental and physical health. We are enshrined so much in the artificial that we need the touch of the real. Even in the center of the metropolis, biophilic towers can reconnect us to the healthful influence of nature.
I spoke with a colleague who worked on the Marina One project in Singapore—a huge, biophilic development that encompasses office buildings, residential towers, and a large public park. He told me that one of the most satisfying aspects of the job was not the construction of the buildings themselves but, rather, the opportunity to witness how people responded to the overall development once it was completed. One of his favorite observations was of the park’s different users—workers who once ate lunch inside their buildings but now enjoyed the park; the residents of the high-rise apartments who could see trees, rather than concrete, from their windows.
These are the interactions that give spaces real meaning.
Biophilic design is more vital than ever as urban centers swell and intensify. This idea of weaving nature into our buildings is not mere high-mindedness. It is a public health imperative and an ecological necessity. Natural elements like light, air, and greenery not only foster human health but also fundamentally shift the low-seeming density of buildings in our ecologically threatened cities. I am both honored and privileged to be part of this critical work.
Biophilic high-rises are the next evolution in the urban environment. They go beyond the trend of incorporating plants and other natural elements into architecture; they are a promise of what is possible. When we say “biophilia,” we are referring not just to the presence of plants but to the innate human connection with a nature that we can touch, hear, smell, and see. Adding biophilic components to our buildings and public spaces creates a kind of architecture that more deeply connects us to the environment.
