Rachel Armstrong
https://doi.org/10.60152/9c5tsmon
Abstract: Holobiontic architecture reimagines buildings as dynamic, multispecies ecosystems—spaces where humans, microbes, and environmental forces interact in continuous exchange. Within this framework, buildings are understood as meta-holobionts: nested assemblages of holobionts that include human occupants, microbial consortia, and environmental agents. This vision centres on the concept of the building-as-reef—an architectural typology that promotes biodiversity, supports regenerative processes, and secures ecological relationships. Like coral reefs, these buildings provide habitat, structure, and metabolic function, transforming the built environment into a scaffold for life. The design strategy that shapes microbial colonization on building surfaces is eco-ornamentation: the intentional crafting of textured, patterned surfaces to support microbial life. These surfaces are not merely decorative; they are biocatalytic, hosting metabolically active organisms that contribute to carbon fixation, pollutant degradation, and redox cycling. In anaerobic zones, advanced bioelectrochemical systems embedded within wastewater infrastructure act as biosensors and metabolic processors, enabling buildings to sense, adapt, and participate in biogeochemical cycles. In contrast to modernist ideals of sterility and minimalism, holobiontic design embraces managed mutualism, where hygiene is reconceived as the cultivation of beneficial microbial communities. Ornamentation becomes a site of ecological function, merging aesthetic expression with biological performance. At the urban scale, individual structures operate as nodes in distributed microbial infrastructures—forming city scale immune systems capable of responding to environmental stressors in real time. This expanded view positions architecture within a broader ecological continuum, where built forms participate in multispecies networks that span scales and domains. Holobiontic architecture thus offers a new protocol for cohabitation: a spatial and biological contract grounded in reciprocity, ecological intelligence, and multispecies collaboration. It provides practical tools for regeneration and a transformative design ethic—one that aligns human habitation with the microbial systems that sustain planetary life.
Keywords: holobiont, eco-ornamentation, microbiome, bioelectrochemical systems, building-as-reef
How to cite this Paper (Harvard referencing style):
Armstrong, R. (2025) ‘Holobiontic Architecture: From Monologue to Multispecies Dialogue‘, in R. Bogdanović (ed.) On Architecture — Crosscutting and Fusion of Disciplines, Proceedings. Belgrade, Serbia: STRAND, pp. 76–88.
See publication On Architecture (2025) Conference Proceedings