NewUrbES: Cities as Living Ecosystems
Swiss National Research Programme NRP 82 “Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services”
Project timeframe: 2026-2028, Zürich
The NewUrbES project challenges conventional boundaries between the built environment and natural systems, proposing that buildings themselves can function as active, regenerative organisms. The project explores how architectural envelopes—facades, walls, and roofs—can be transformed into continuous habitats that enhance biodiversity, supply critical ecosystem services, and foster human-nature coexistence through innovative ecological design, regenerative materials, and adaptive planning.
NewUrbES investigates the transformation of urban areas into ecosystems where human and non-human species thrive together. By integrating principles of ecological design, regenerative material science, and adaptive planning, the project seeks to reconfigure building envelopes into connective habitats that link indoor and outdoor spaces. Anchored in two case studies in Zurich, the research employs a transdisciplinary methodology that combines empirical studies, material prototyping, and digital technologies within an iterative design-science loop to continuously generate, test, and refine solutions.
Urbanisation presents significant challenges to global biodiversity but also unique opportunities for ecological regeneration. NewUrbES promotes a fundamental shift where built structures perform as functional ecosystems, connecting fragmented green spaces and reducing the biodiversity footprint of construction. To enable this transformation, the project develops novel regenerative building materials, a practical toolbox for assessing ecosystem services impacts, a serious game for negotiating urban transformation barriers, and evidence-based recommendations for planners, policymakers, and citizens. In dense, affluent urban contexts like Switzerland, this approach is crucial for restoring biodiversity and enhancing vital ecosystem services.
The project is built upon a robust transdisciplinary process bridging ecology, architectural design, material science, and spatial planning, supported by digital technologies and iterative design-science loops. It synthesises empirical research on materials and urban ecosystem services with 3D virtual experiments and real-case studies to generate and refine solutions for urban living spaces that integrate human and other species. From the outset, research challenges were defined jointly with stakeholders to ensure outcomes are salient for both science and practice. Implementation pathways are explored through serious games and collaboration with the practice partner Natur & Wirtschaft, which integrates findings into its building label system. This guarantees that results inform building codes, design practices, and investment strategies, enabling a systemic transformation towards urban environments that actively enhance biodiversity and ecosystem services.
Project Leaders
Prof. Dr. Adrienne Grét-Regamey, ETH Zürich
Prof. Dr. Christoph Küffer, Eastern Switzerland University of Applied Sciences (OST)
Prof. Dr. Guillaume Habert, ETH Zürich
Prof. Maria Conen, ETH Zürich / Studio Conen
Reto Locher, Stiftung Natur & Wirtschaft
Project Partners
Dr. Philipp Urech, ETH Zürich
Flurina Gardin, ETH Zürich
