Learning from nature? A Conversation with Biochemist Irina Iachina and Architect Pavels Hedström about Biomimetic Design

Access to clean drinking water is an urgent global priority. Today 2 billion people lack access to clean drinking water which results in the destabilisation of human settlements, growing inequalities, and a threat to the existence of both human and non-human life. An increasing trend of privatization of freshwater demands new strategies of how to create accessible and alternative water infrastructures. 

The Atacama Desert is the driest non-polar area on the planet, similar to the extreme environments on Mars. Through billions of years, life has learned to adapt to the harsh conditions in the Atacama Desert. Plants such as the Cactus have developed strategies for how to harvest and contain water from coastal fog. These intelligent systems have been studied in the making of the biomimetic design of the Fog-X Jacket.

The Fog-X Jacket

Fog-X jacket gives the user the ability to collect up to 10 liters of drinkable water each day by collecting fog, even in the most arid areas on earth. The inflatable design of the jacket enables the user to be light and mobile in the landscape. With only a few steps of adjustments, the jacket can transform into a fog-catching station that provides shelter for the user, while harvesting fog.

Learn more about the Fog-X Jacket

About the event series

For the current window exhibition, “Strange Adaptions” by Inxects CAFx invited professionals from diverse backgrounds to unfold in conversation with Pavels Hedström some of the exhibition's speculations about present and future global challenges and adaptions through regenerative design concepts.

Inxects is a design practice founded by the acclaimed architect Pavels Hedström, on how architecture, art, and technology can minimise the gap between humans and the rest of nature through design and technology.