This is part one on a series on climate change and different adaptive and regenerative strategies. Climate change and the many challenges it will bring is a very complex and multifaceted topic. As most people should know by now, it’s caused by an abundance of certain gases in the atmosphere that insulate the planet a … Read more Don’t hate your parents- climate change and the generation question
I visited the German bee museum in Weimar last week. It was founded in 1910 by Ferdinand Gerstung. Gerstung was a big deal in the early twentieth century beekeeping world and introduced the concept of “the bien”. The “Bien” considered the whole hive-super-organism instead of focusing on the individual bees. While bees are totally amazing and I … Read more 5 lessons I learned from beehives
I met Thami Croeser at Roof Water Farm in Berlin to learn more about green infrastructure initiatives around the world. Thami is replication lead for the Urban Green Up! Project. The project is funded by the EU Horizon 2020 fund and aims at the development, application and replication of Renaturing Urban Plans in a number … Read more Lead with beauty
Who has the right to the land and its space? Spaces can feel different depending on how they are managed. Roaming Germany and many other countries in Europe allow you to walk across other people’s land without fear of getting shot. It’s romantically called ‘the right to roam ’ in England. In Germany, you can only … Read more Maintenance of the commons
I will never forget what the houses in Australia felt like. A very common type of building there are floating weatherboard buildings. The house is basically on little 30cm high stumps. There is no basement. Then there are the floorboards through which one can see the ground under the house. The walls are simple stud … Read more Quality of housing
I am an engineer. Supposedly people don’t expect much finesse from engineers. What do you think about, when you hear that something is “engineered”? It sounds like it is shiny, efficient, somehow made from stainless steel and works well. I don’t particularly associate “engineered” items with how they look and definitely not with how they … Read more Why design matters
Many career guides give us the advice to find or follow our “passion”. They advocate for the job-seeker to dig deep and find the flame that burns within. Didn’t we all want to be a fireman or a pilot? How many pilots do we need? An essential requirement for today’s workforce seems to be passion. … Read more When passions turn into obsessions
There are two ways to travel. One path is tourism. The other path is travel. Although they sound interchangeable and it is possible to walk both paths on one trip, the experience is entirely different. The path of the tourist The tourist is primarily concerned about destination. Get somewhere and do something. The tourist likes … Read more Two different ways to go on a trip
My cycling history Originally I was inspired to cycle on holidays by a book that my dad gave me about the tour around the equator by Tilmann Waldthaler. The guy is something of an original in the cycle touring world, starting to cycle in the 70s, when there weren’t many around and you had to make the … Read more Eight reasons why I love bicycle touring
The way humans communicate is a very inefficient process called language. We don’t think about the miracle of speech very often but the way it works is pretty incredible. I have no better way of expressing it, so let’s quote the great Tim Urban: “The next time you’re talking to someone, I want you to stop … Read more Why it’s important to be articulate