Michael Pawlyn

Michael Pawlyn is a passionate advocate of, and keynote speaker on biomimicry and innovation. Michael Pawlyn has been described as a pioneer of regenerative design and biomimicry and is dedicated to marrying up the inspirations of nature to use in his work as an architect. After achieving outstanding success as architect for the Eden Project, Michael has lectured widely on the subject of sustainable design in the UK and abroad and speaks on biomimicry, innovation, sustainability and energy and climate change solutions.

Michael Pawlyn has been described as a pioneer of regenerative design and biomimicry. He established his firm Exploration Architecture in 2007 to focus on high performance buildings and solutions for the circular economy. The company has developed a ground-breaking office project, an ultra-low energy data centre, a zero waste textiles factory and progressive solutions for green cities.

Prior to setting up Exploration Michael Pawlyn worked with Grimshaw for ten years and was central to the team that designed the Eden Project. He is regularly booked as a keynote speaker on innovation and his TED talk has had over 1.9 million viewings. His book Biomimicry in Architecture has been RIBA Publications’ best-selling title and a second edition was published in October 2016. Michael Pawlyn jointly initiated the widely acclaimed Sahara Forest Project; the latest version of which was opened by the King of Jordan in 2017. In 2019 he was involved in launching ‘Architects Declare’ which has spread internationally and now has over a thousand companies signed up to addressing the climate and biodiversity crisis.

Michael’s work has been featured in Wired, The Economist, New Scientist, National Geographic and many other international newspapers and magazines. He has also featured on Radio 4 and the Discovery Channel.

Able to confidently explain energy and climate change solutions to all kinds of audiences, discuss biomimicry and sustainability in a keynote speech and share stories from his time on the Eden Project, Michael is a brilliant sustainability and green speaker.

Most recently, Michael has co-authored book Flourish (launched at the beginning of 2022) which has been the publisher’s best-selling title and has attracted endorsements from prominent figures including Es Devlin, Kate Raworth and Alice Rawsthorn. The book has also informed the content of Michael's talks as it describes the next urgent shift in thinking: how we move on from conventional sustainability to a regenerative mindset in which we strive to have a net positive impact and learn to integrate everything we do as humans into the web of life that supports us.

2023 finished on a high with a prestigious fellowship in regenerative design from the 1851 Commission.

Photo credit to Kelly Hill Photography