When attempting to set up an indoor waterfall feature, I managed to flood my bathroom last month. Unlike tabletop fountains that splasth, the water in my home nearly reached the two-inch mark, both overflowing and seeping into the ceiling of my downstairs neighbor’s apartment. Yikes. To my surprise, all things considered, Mrs. Chen from apartment 2B was quite understanding. During my frantic 11 PM visit to her home, where I came bearing towels and bursting with regret, she nonchalantly commented, “
Her response baffled my expectations, but I realized Mrs. Chen was not entirely wrong—in my eyes.
The foundation of my waterfall idea can be traced back to that stunning spa I visited in the Columbia Gorge. The spa featured exquisite slate water walls that produced a soft, soothing waterfall-like sound. Spas are meant to be relaxing: you acknowledge the wonderful experience that is right in front of you in such a way as to create a desire for repetition.
Two weeks later. I was binge-watching YouTube videos and buying parts from some dubious website that offered “Easy DIY Indoor Waterfalls—No Experience Necessary!” Imagine my disappointment when, upon his discovery, I learned that constructing a water feature involves plumbing skills. Who would have thought? (Everyone. Everyone except me knew this.)
Jessie, my friend and a licensed contractor, showed up while I was cleaning up the mess and for about five minutes, stood in the doorway cackling. “This is why you call me BEFORE you start drilling into water pipes,” she nearly gasped between laughs. After the damage I inflicted with my “DIY” project capped the plumbing, patched up the walls, and concealed the waterworks mess beneath the floor, she proposed that if I continued to attempt to bring water features into my apartment, I should only choose ones that are pre-assembled and sealed in boxes.
To be honest, that has essentially been my experience with biophilic design. An ambitious vision, messy implementation, steady refinement, and ultimately—after much delay—achieving a home that truly feels like a retreat. Biophilic design is, in simpler terms, the integration of nature into our built surroundings. In spite of some of my blunders, I have been able to breathe life into my run-of-the-mill Portland apartment, making it feel as if it is brimming with nature, even though it is situated in the heart of the city.
*A living room with plants and natural elements showcasing biophilic design principles*
Without an architectural degree, an endless budget, or extraordinarily tolerant neighbors living below me, here’s how I managed to incorporate biophilic design into a standard home.
I’m definitely not an Amazon worker relaxing in those stunning Spheres in Seattle (although I once masqueraded as a food delivery person simply to have a glance inside—this is our little secret). It is my one-bedroom, 950 square foot apartment with a beige-obsessed landlord that has unwillingly destituted me to the life of a hamster at a pet store. I have come to terms with the fact that true biophilic design does not stem from flawless, social media-ready settings, but rather the effective implementation of nature.
My initial ideas were, as expected, simply “add plants and stir.” One Saturday, I went to Portland Nursery and impulsively bought seventeen plants. Within the first month, I managed to kill or had only doomed fourteen. As it turns out, there is no sheer optimism strategy vacationing in a dark corner. My friend Carlos, who works at Pistils in North Portland, eventually staged what he called a “plant intervention.”
“Pliggins are sopolithic entities with distinct requirements,” he stated while assessing the pathetic leftovers of my fiddle leaf fig massacre. “They aren’t furniture.” He guided me on how to select the right types of plants that could thrive in the light conditions I had. Turns out they were mostly pothos, ZZ plants, and some surprisingly tough snake plants. More importantly, he focused on training me to think like a plant; tracking where light hits at different hours of the day, air movement, and where heat from radiators could potentially stress certain species.
That was key lesson one. The focus should always be to observe the space. This a the principle of biophilic design where the structural framework of buildings incorporates features of the natural landscape surrounding the structure.
After having plants that survived and even thrived, I observed how they changed my relationship with my apartment. With them, I became more mindful of the seasons and the accompanying light changes. During hectic days, I turned chaos into calm through centering rituals focused on caring for my plants, helping me cultivate greater awareness. I would pause to catch the new leaves as they unfurled, something I would previously miss.
One day, my neighbor Emma stopped by after observing my gradual plant appreciation. She said, “Your place feels different now. Like, it feels like someone lives here instead of just stores their stuff here.” Remarkably, that was the feel, alive in a way it hadn’t before.
Unlike most people, I considered plant care a chore, but they did provide me with an excuse to go outside. They did serve as a gateway to full-blown biophilic design obsession. Even in a rental, I started noticing elements that could strengthen my connection to nature without making big changes.
Light was a big one. I had these heavy blackout curtains that came with the apartment. True, they were amazing for sleeping, but they blocked any natural light cycles as well. I swapped them out with sheer linen that provided more privacy and let light filter through. Oh my God, what a difference that made! Instead of being jolted awake by my phone alarm in what felt like a sensory deprivation chamber, I started waking up naturally with the sun.
Materials came next. I slowly started switching out plastic and synthetic materials with natural ones. Polyester was replaced with a wool rug, plastic bowls were switched out for wooden ones, and microfiber sheets were traded for linen. Each change, no matter how small, altered the feel of the space in a different, but meaningful way. There’s something about touching real wood or stone that synthetic materials just can’t replicate.
Tasha, my interior designer friend, explained it to me while we were having coffee at Heart Roasters. “Your brain is always performing a background check of your senses, even if you’re not aware of it,” she explained. “Natural materials have variation—differences in texture, temperature conductivity, and even smell. These differences are what we have evolved to respond to.”
Instead of merely considering the visual aspects of my home, I focused on the central sensory experience it offered. I bought a small tabletop fountain (thank you for not being a DIY project) that masked the gentle traffic with soft bubbling noises. I got an essential oil diffuser that used cedar and pine scents which subtly evoked forest walks. Most importantly, I replaced my harsh blue-white LED light bulbs with ones that emitted a warmer spectrum, resembling sunlight.
Maya, hailing from PSU, surprised me the most with her insights on “prospect and refuge,” as she referred to it. It is essentially the idea that our caveman brains operate at maximum comfort when we can see out (prospect) and feel protected (refuge). To test this idea, I rearranged my furniture and created a new reading nook in a corner that has a view of the whole apartment and the windows with a backed solid wall. It actually became everyone’s favorite spot. No joke, people actually fight over it when I have some friends over for dinner.
“That’s your primitive brain telling you it’s the safest spot in the room,” was Maya’s response after sharing this story with her. “You can see potential threats coming but can’t be approached from behind.” I’m 80% sure the only “threats” in my apartment are the occasional spider and my unexplained urge to impulse buy strange kitchen gadgets, but apparently my amygdala does not know that.
The last item on my personal agenda is the herb wall in my garden, which is part of the creative kitchen design biophilia experiment. Unlike the bathroom waterfall tech babble drama, theatre of the absurd set mistake, this time I had both proper advice and proper plans. I actually talked to Carlos about lights, which pocket planters to use, and guess what, it worked! Now I have a vertical basil, mint, thyme, and rosemary planter that sits next to my stove. My culinary experience now includes touching, smelling, and even tasting plants. This makes cooking feel more purposeful and motivated.
Last Tuesday, my friend and Tusk chef Tom came over for a casual drink and couldn’t help but notice my herb wall. “Smart,” he commented and touched the rosemary stems. “Most people don’t consider to what extent raising herbs helps with cooking. You really start learning about the plants when you’re ‘self-infusing’: their peaks, how they alter season contents. It truly changes one’s understanding of the cycles nature has to offer.” This phrase shocked me due to how pronounced the concept of biophilia is compared to nature and natural systems due to it reaches a much wider audience since day one with my projects.
I added the bedroom as my next frontier. The quality of sleep is closely connected to the natural cycles and the realization strikes me that my bedroom is essentially a cave with no windows or opening to the outside world. I added a tiny ZZ plant that doesn’t need bright light, switched to real linen sheets (which are horrendously overpriced) to all natural bedding, and got one of those new sunrise alarm clocks that mimic the dawn by gradually increasing light. My sleep tracking app began showing positive trends within a week — my time to fall asleep was lower and the amount of rest I was feeling upon waking was improving.
All of this, including the disasters, has taught me that biophilic design is not a checklist or an aesthetic. It is about forming bonds with nature and its elements in a meaningful way, as well as patters. Sometimes it is nature itself, in the form of plants and water, natural materials like wood stone and fibers, or mimicking natural patters such as light cycles and prospect and refuge layouts.
Best put by Dr. Samantha Lin, a biophilic design researcher out of University of Washington and someone I managed to corner at a conference last year, The goal isn’t to create a perfect nature simulation. It’s to provide enough meaningful connections that nervous systems recognize and respond to. She would explain how small interventions are capable of making a difference if they are contextually multi-sensory or appeal to deeply ingrained behavior blueprints.”
Let us be honest, we have all had that liberating realization – accomplishing the goal does not actually require a bold architectural shift or the budget of the Amazon Spheres’. More thought needs to go into genuinely connecting people to elements of nature such as patterns and processes instead.
My apartment has not reached perfection just yet. The bathroom is still clad in industrial beige tile that no amount of trailing pothos can beautify. Kitchen cupboards still sport that baffling fake wood laminate. I still feel the need to take care of plants, which results in me overwatering them (it’s my love language, apparently). Nevertheless, the apartment feels fundamentally different compared to how it felt a year ago. Now, it feels alive. It feels connected. It feels as if it elevates wellbeing rather than simply storing my belongings.
Yes, growth can involve mild flooding, and for me, hasn’t always been graceful.
If you would like to incorporate biophilic design into your living space, these are the changes I’ve made ranked from easiest/cheapest to most costly and time consuming:
1. **Lightesthesia:** Ensure that there are no hindrances to the inflow of natural light durante the day and include soft spectrum lamps for the after-hours.
2. **Plantic companions tailored to your environment:** Make sure that your conditions for light and humidity levels are realistic instead of optimums. Beginners should start with unkillable starters like snake plants, ZZ plants, and pothos.
3. **Natural materials:** Start substituting items made from synthetic materials with natural ones— wool, cotton, wood, stone, etc—slowly over time.
4. **Water and sound:** Incorporate the use of nature sounds to mask urban noise or add small water features (if properly installed!).
5. **Associative scents:** Enhance spaces using natural scents tied to nature such as cedar, pine, or floral notes.
6. **Design for refuge and prospect:** Position seating areas to provide views while ensuring some protective shielding.
7. **Visual connections to outside:** Utilize nature photography if you lack real views, but do not block windows.
8. **Natural patterns and forms:** Strive to include organic shapes and avoid symmetry.
Make sure to monitor the effects the shifts have on your feelings about the space. And if you’re planning to make big changes to the structure, like cutting into water pipes, maybe reaching out to a professional could be a good idea.
My next project? It is a moss wall for my home office. Carlos has made it very clear that I must consult with him before I order anything, and Jessie made me sign a mock “contract” stating that I will not drill into any walls without adult supervision. I can’t blame them.
The point is, our houses should not only be designed to store our things, but rather be a space that enables us to wellbeing while keeping us in touch with our primal behavioors. Sometimes that means sophisticated water features that definitely will not flood your downstairs neighbor’s apartment (sorry again, Mrs. Chen), and sometimes it just means opening your curtains and actually observing how light shifts throughout the day.
My apartment feels more like a home than any other place I’ve lived in. Not because it’s perfect or admirable, but because it’s alive. As I learn more and experiment with biophilic design principles, I become more attached to the notion that this is what biophilic design means.
