Design for the living world.
The systems we have built are extraordinary. The ones we have failed to build are even more so.
Placeholder, from Symbiosis in Development
A comprehensive framework for designing whole systems toward regeneration
The world's largest ecosystem rooftop, 2.2 hectares above downtown San Francisco
Seven years, 484 GWh saved. Enough to light 145,000 Swedish homes for a year.
Company-wide circularity vision, strategy, and roadmap for 100+ breweries
Historic train depot transformed into an energy-neutral circular coworking hub
Sustainability strategy for one of Europe's busiest airports
Regenerative agriculture and community resilience
A vision for Ho Chi Minh City's sustainable urban future
Sustainability is not a destination. It is a relationship between a system and its context, maintained through continuous adaptation.
Placeholder, from SiD framework
A framework for designing whole systems toward regeneration. 468 pages, 12 years in the making.
150+ pages of innovations in sustainable homes, cities, and daily life. Creative Commons licensed.
200 years of utopian city projects, and what they teach us about the ones we are building now.
Open learning platform for systems thinking and sustainability. Video courses, exercises, expert tracks.
Every building is a theory about how people should live. Most of them are wrong in interesting ways.
Placeholder, keynote
Keynotes, masterclasses, and lectures for organizations ready to think in systems.
Strategic advisory, board membership, and consulting for organizations navigating complex transitions.
Advisory inquiry
I have spent most of my career trying to understand how large systems work, then redesigning them so they work for more people and fewer landfills. I founded Except in 1999. In the 25 years since, we have taken on roughly 700 projects in architecture, urban planning, circular economy, and systems design.
Some of that work I can point to. The ecological systems inside Salesforce Park in San Francisco: 2.2 hectares of living rooftop. Seven years helping IKEA redesign supply-chain energy use, which cut 484 GWh. A circular roadmap for more than 100 Heineken breweries. I wrote Symbiosis in Development, a 468-page open-source framework for designing whole systems toward regeneration, and built a teaching platform (ThinkSiD) around it.
I am an architect and engineer by training (Yale, TU Delft). Since 2021, I have been based in Ho Chi Minh City, working on what still holds my attention: design for the living world.