Regenerative Design: Embracing a New-Old Mindset

As regenerative design continues to gain momentum across the industries of architecture, engineering, and construction, it is often presented as a new paradigm for proactively addressing climate change by design. However, many of its core principles are based on knowledge, culture, and practices built over millennia.  

This session explores how regenerative design builds upon enduring lessons from passive design, vernacular architecture, Indigenous knowledge, and systems thinking that have long worked in harmony with local climates, ecosystems, and available resources. Panelists will examine how an understanding of natural flows—of energy, water, materials, and living systems—can reshape contemporary practice, moving beyond efficiency and impact reduction toward restoring ecological and brain health, as well as community regeneration. By reconnecting with these time-tested principles through the lens of today's climate challenges, attendees will discover how regenerative design represents not a departure from architectural tradition, but a return to a more holistic, place-based way of thinking about the built environment. 

9:00am–10:00am Panel Discussion #1 – Reconnecting the Built Environment & Living Systems 
This panel explores how regenerative design positions buildings as active participants in restoring biodiversity, watershed health, and ecosystem resilience through a combination of ancient principles rich in heritage, in combination with modern technology and new generation of materials.

10:00am–11:00am Panel Discussion # 2 – Brain-Body-Biosphere: Design for Heath of People and Planet
In the face of climate and other environmental change, our brains and our planet are under unprecedented stress. This panel brings together experts in neuroscience, architecture, psychology, and planetary health to explore how we can design environments, policies, and daily practices that protect and strengthen both brain health and ecological systems. From nature-based solutions to regenerative design, we’ll share actionable ways to foster resilience at the personal, community, and planetary levels.

Speakers include:

Introduction:
Illya Azaroff, FAIA, President, AIA National

Panel 1:     
Lindsay Baker, CEO, International Living Futures Institute
Sergio Saenz, Global Place Sector Director, HKS
Mija Hubler, Associate Professor/Co-Director of the Center for Infrastructure, Energy and Space Testing (CIEST), University of Colorado – Boulder
Moderator:
Yasemin Kologlu, Director of Regenerative Design, HKS

Panel 2:    
Burcin Ikiz, Founder, Neuro Climate Working Group
Jessica Kronstadt, Program Director, Planetary Health Alliance
Suchi Reddy, Founding Principal, Reddymade
Moderator:
Julie Hiromoto, Director of Integration, HKS