Billionaire magazine

Billionaire magazine interview female leaders in biodesign including Prof. Claudia Pasquero, Prof. Carole Collet, and our founder, Dr. Melissa Sterry.

Read the article here.

Extract:

‘But biodesign’s applications go far beyond fashion and apparel. For British design scientist Melissa Sterry, biodesign has been a three-decade journey that started in fashion and is now centred on addressing the growing problem of wildfire resilience. “My first exploration in the field was in 1994, when I conceived of a ready-to-wear collection that could biodegrade at the end of the season and that could not only be safely reabsorbed by the environment, but provide nutrients for soils, thus plant life.” She was one of very few designers working in biodesign at the time. Thirty years into her career, Sterry has worked with biodesign across fashion, architecture, urban design, construction, planning, service design, manufacturing and more.  

Today she is using biodesign with a practical application to help build resilience to wildfires. “I have family living in one of the most wildfire-prone regions of Southern California and thus hear about the issues involved in living with wildfire first-hand.”  

Essentially, her work has involved studying how some plants have evolved to live with wildfire and mimicking these traits and systems, from the molecular level upwards, then migrating the traits of plants to architectural and urban resilience to wildfires. Currently seeking backers, she hopes to soon commercialise applications for residential, commercial, and civic buildings in the wildland urban interface.  

Sterry is confident that all sorts of biodesign will be commercialised soon to address some of the world’s issues, as she is being increasingly asked to consult with executives in industry and government. “The nature of this work is led by practice. My reference points are concepts that having already reached prototype stage are either at, or near to proof of concept commercially. For business experts and investors that want to enter the field it’s a new frontier and place where there are copious opportunities for firsts.”