The Ecology Pillar: Why ‘Healthy Planet’ thinking is necessary in every place
- Village Well
- Jul 30
- 5 min read
In a time of climate disruption, declining biodiversity, and increasing disconnection from nature, the way we design and care for our places has never mattered more. In our last post, we introduced Village Well’s Regenerative Placemaking Model, which sees place as an interconnected system shaped by five key pillars:
Healthy Planet (Ecologies)
Thriving Cultures (Culture)
Joyful People (People)
Loveable places (Built environment)
Thriving Economics (Local Economics)
In this post, we will explore the first of these: Ecologies, a lens that helps us measure a place’s contribution to a healthy planet. The term is plural, as places have many ecosystems interacting in complex ways to give life to the place.
A healthy ecology isn’t just about “greening” space. It’s about designing places where people can feel, act, and live in tune with the natural world. Below, we break down four key layers relevant for the ‘ecologies’ pillar, and show how placemaking that respects and restores nature delivers benefits to people, places and the planet.
Connection to Nature: From Love to Action
Does this place invite people to bond with and care for the natural world? Are there trees to sit under, birds to watch, or gardens to tend? Are there many local groups actively caring for local ecology? Do people know their local ecosystem?
Regenerative placemaking offers an opportunity to re-ignite emotional bonds with nature, and those bonds often inspire people to act. Across Australia, we’re seeing a shift: not just conservation from afar, but communities getting involved in rewilding and regenerating where they live.
Active communities are transforming once-neglected spaces into areas that can boost biodiversity, share ecological knowledge, and empower people to become active stewards of their local ecosystems. For example, In Melbourne, there are many different groups where local community has taken an active role to restore their creeks (e.g. Merri Creek, Edgar's Creek) and rewild their public spaces (Rewilding Stonnington). Can you think of any project doing something similar within your local community?
Nature Experiences: Access to nature that Restores and Revives
Does the place offer immersive natural environments? Are the natural spaces rich and complex, offering opportunities for reflection, play, and exploration?
When access to nature becomes part of everyday life, people and places both thrive. Regular interaction with complex, natural environments can significantly improve mental and physical wellbeing, especially in urban life.
The science is clear: daily doses of nature reduce stress, aid recovery, and even increase productivity and learning. Taking up surfing, greening schools, or taking a daily nature walk within your busy day are all activities that can transform nature into the ‘medicine’ you need to boost your physical and mental health.
Nature-rich places in our cities, like thoughtfully designed parks and streets, invite people to slow down, rest and restore, providing the time to maximise restorative mental health benefits” that only immersive nature can provide. These immersive experiences can still be possible within an urbanised environment.
For example, the Level Crossings Removal Project, VIC, offers multiple types of nature experiences along its route. While both offer benefits, the more diverse and natural look of the second photo has a higher restorative effect.
Biodiversity Inclusivity: Cities as Havens, Not Hazards
Does the place support local wildlife survival and conservation? Is the habitat varied and complex? Are there strategies in place to reduce negative impacts to biodiversity? What ‘types’ of biodiversity is valued in this place?
Built environments have traditionally displaced native species, making urbanisation one of the leading causes for biodiversity loss, but placemaking and design are now actively being used to reimagine cities as part of the biodiversity solution.
Globally, urban rewilding is bringing species back to urbanised environments, from beavers in London to hornbills in Singapore they bring proof that we can actually design our neighbourhoods, towns and cities to preserve biodiversity.
Here in Australia, the Fishermans Bend renewal project in Melbourne has set biodiversity targets within its planning framework, embedding ecological inclusivity in every layer of design.
Even small-scale interventions can bring life back into the urban fabric. For example, installing wildlife friendly lighting, adaptive lighting or embracing light-off programs are all ways to reduce the impact for biodiversity.
Ecologists and designers are also working together to create bat bricks, bird bricks and more, creating new materials that will simultaneously help people and wildlife. But it is important to make sure they’ve been tested locally and work for local wildlife.
Natural Systems: Working With, Not Against, Nature
Is this place aligned with its local ecology — its geology, water flows, microclimate and soil? Are those relationships visible, celebrated, or respected? Are ecological flows considered and supported in the design and use of space?
At its deepest level, ecology in placemaking means supporting the natural systems that sustain life, air, water, soil, and food. Attempts to control these systems can break the way they function and reduce their resilience. However, we can use ‘living infrastructure’ to tackle complex ecological issues within urban environments by emulating the ways natural systems work. For example:
Many cities around the world are embracing China’s ‘sponge city’ approach, where urban areas are designed to absorb and filter stormwater through wetlands, swales and permeable surfaces. This approach helps recover the water cycle and increases urban resilience to flood events.
Other cities are actively daylighting, and/or renaturing their rivers, an approach where waterways are brought back to the surface and recover their riverine qualities. Famous examples of this in action include the Cheonggyechon stream, Seoul, South Korea, which increased overall biodiversity by 639%, and the Bishan Park, Singapore. These two examples helped pave the way for other projects, highlighting massive benefits for nature, people and urban resilience.
Or consider urban food growing and foraging, which is reconnecting communities with the land and closing loops on waste and nutrition. Depending on how the food is grown, these processes can adopt regenerative agriculture approaches to grow organic food while simultaneously restoring the soil cycle.
These practices not only make ecological sense, they build resilience, reduce cost of living, and bring people together.
To conclude, Regenerative Placemaking must consider ecology in its approach as it fundamentally aims to restore the balance of the system, not just environmentally, but socially and emotionally. By embedding ecological thinking in the way we understand, envision and act to support places, we create more resilient, joyful and meaningful communities.
Next up, we explore the second pillar in our regenerative placemaking model: Flourishing Culture.
Comments