Marcelyn Gow introduces David Benjamin, principal of The Living. Benjamin characterizes his approach as based on the premise that buildings can be living, breathing organisms, and might be understood as a loops interconnected in a larger ecosystem. He proposes to discuss The Living’s work under three categories: Research, Books and Buildings.

Benjamin discusses in detail three kinds of research projects. Under the category Bio Computing, the Bionic Partition Project, in collaboration with Airbus, Autodesk, and APWorks; under Bio Sensing, the Pier 35 EcoPark project in New York City; under Bio Manufacturing, the Hy-Fi biological building material, for MOMA / P.S. 1 (2014)

Benjamin discusses two upcoming book projects: Embodied Energy and Design: making architecture between metrics and narratives (Lars Müller, 2017), and Now We See Now: generative architecture and research by The Living (Monacelli Press, 2018).

Benjamin stresses that The Living is committed to building, demonstrated by two recent projects: the new office for Autodesk @ MaRS Innovation District, Toronto (2017), and the Embodied Computation Lab, Princeton University (2017).