Essay

As a designer you are probably always thinking about new and exciting ways to integrate nature into your design. Yes, nature needs to harmonize with your design aesthetically and functionally — but what if it could also interact with your design — virtually?

There are times within an architectural space when actual nature is not feasible. For instance, a hospital patient room does not usually include nature within the room for fear of bacteria and so on. Thus, virtual nature can be used to replicate some of nature’s own properties like changes in season, movement, or even color and beauty. Virtual nature can be a powerful tool to use within your design.

To give you a better idea of how virtual nature can be combined with real-world physical elements, take a look at the following video where an augmented reality sandbox shows a real-time water flow simulation. Notice how the virtual nature (the water) interacts with the physical elements (the sand). Then think about how this concept can be applied to your own architecture in a variety of applications.

So, when designing your architecture, consider applications where virtual nature could help your building occupants. For example, virtual nature within an office space can help with attention and focus — when the employee is exposed to nature for 15-20 minutes. Also, within a hospital setting, virtual nature could be used to calm patients and provide them with beauty which can help ease pain.

Furthermore, within your project, look for ways that virtual nature can interact with physical elements — and remember, they don’t always have to be visual. In fact, just yesterday I saw an exterior wall that plays music every time it rains. Thus, sound can be used as well (the sounds of nature).

I invite you to play with nature within your design, by thinking outside of the box. Don’t always rely on actual nature or think that you cannot have nature in certain settings — because with virtual nature much is possible. It only remains up to your imagination.

Image Credit: © linh.ngan | Flickr