Kumiki house

How might we live in a regenerative landscape?

What

Vision and roadmap

Client

Kumiki architecture

When

2023

Services

Foresight

Creative outputs

Dutch architecture firm Kumiki is working on a new paradigm for bio-based building.

Beyond their architectural practice; Kumiki is innovating many new building techniques that make it possible to live in the countryside while having a net-positive effect on the landscape: think using local, ecological materials; creating homes for wildlife within the building; and building in a modular, light-touch way.

Although they already had a strong ambition to design and build a model home that could showcase this new way of building; there were many open questions that kept them from confidently choosing a direction:

How can the initiative contribute to the transition to a more regenerative Dutch countryside? And how will their future context change exactly? How can they engage with other initiatives? Who should be their target audience? And what steps do they need to take to make their vision for bio-based building a reality?

Through a series of futures workshops, we analysed the bigger picture and helped Kumiki articulate what role they want to play in realising a future where nature, humans and agriculture can coexist in the Dutch countryside.

Together with the Kumiki team, we identified demographic, architectural and agricultural trends and created scenarios for the Dutch countryside of 2045.

These scenarios made it possible to then imagine possible roles for the Kumiki house in working towards a regenerative future.

Once a vision and audience were articulated, we did a backcasting workshop where we identified concrete milestones and steps for the Kumiki team. The steps were divided in five different focus areas:

1. Developing a viable bio-based design

2. Developing and scaling a building process

3. Involving (future) residents and other stakeholders

4. Active engagement with the public debate on transitioning the landscape

5. Funding and resourcing the project

Finally we created a large, visual poster that illustrated the milestones and actions. The poster now hangs in the Kumiki office, and serves as a daily motivating reminder of where they are heading.