We are excited to announce that we were part of the winning team for the Re-Imagining The Garden City competition hosted by the Royal Institute of British Architects. 

It was an absolute delight to work with some brilliant minds to put forward a garden city design integrating an ecological infrastructure framework that is interwoven into the social fabric of daily life. The conceptual masterplan was designed by EcoResponsive Environments with input from Peter Neal Landscape Consultant, Studio 4215, Transform Places, Carbon Dynamic, Holistic City Ltd., BNP Paribas Real Estate and, of course, us over here at Biomatrix Water. 

The Competition attracted 95 submissions from architect-led interdisciplinary teams from around the world and aimed to discover new designs for a modern Garden City to meet the needs of the 21st Century. We are seeing an increase in the integration of holistic, nature based systems in large scale town/city planning projects. Whether it is ecological placemaking for the wellbeing of people and biodiversity, or infrastructure projects that work with elemental systems. These kinds of projects help us imagine living in a more ecologically inclusive world.  

Biomatrix’s main input centred around the natural treatment of wastewater. Drawing from our experience operating the Findhorn Foundations Living Machine ecological wastewater treatment facility.   

The Living Machine in Findhorn is an onsite decentralised community scale natural water treatment system. The waste water runs through a series of tanks within a greenhouse. Each tank is full of life. Hydrophilic plants are the foundation, their roots grow down into the water and are colonised by bacteria and micro-organisms. These little beings break down the nutrients and contaminants in the water redistributing and sequestering them as part of their own biological processes.

The out-flowing water, has zero discharge to surface water, complies with the strictest environmental regulations and is cleaner than chemical treatment processes. At this moment in time we are proud to celebrate 24 years of continuous regulations compliance and successful ecological treatment at the Living Machine! 

The wonderfully illustrated and incredibly detailed plans are available for download as a pdf here: http://ribacompetitions.com/letchworthgardencity/winner.html

…and if you are interested in ecological wastewater treatment check out our latest technology on the Helix Flow Reactor page