New European Bauhaus Prizes 2023

Initiative category

Identify the award category for which this initiative is being submitted
Reconnecting with nature

Email user
vera.meyer@tu-berlin.de

Basic information
Initiative title
MY-CO SPACE

Full initiative Title
MY-CO SPACE is a habitable sculpture made of wood and fungi by the Berlin SciArt Collective MY-CO-X

Please provide a short, catchy description of your initiative to be used in communication towards the public.
MY-CO SPACE is a habitable sculpture made of wood and fungi that invites the sensual reflection and exploration of sustainable ways of living and dwelling on our planet. The load-bearing wooden structure, covered with 330 fungal panels, is intended to make life in the smallest space (analogous to that of a space capsule) and co-habitation with fungi physically tangible. It was built from organic materials and thus fully biodegradable. Currently, it is on show at a University library in Berlin.

What was the geographical scope of your intiative?
National

Where was your intiative implemented?
Member State(s) and Western Balkans
Germany

If relevant, insert names of region(s)/municipality(ies) involved
Frankfurt Rhine-Main metropolitan region (Frankfurt, Darmstadt, Wiesbaden)
Berlin

Does your initiative address mainly urban or rural issues?
It addresses urban-rural linkages

Does your initiative refer to a physical transformation of the built environment or other types of transformations (hard or soft investments)?
It refers to a physical transformation of the built environment (hard investment)

Has your initiative benefited from EU programmes and/or funds?
No

Has your initiative won an EU prize with a monetary value awarded?
No

Does your initiative has a minimum level of maturity? The minimum level of maturity is exemplified by stakeholder/ initiative promoter commitment to implement the initiative in practice and a clear methodology /approach.
Yes

On whose behalf are you submitting the application?
As an individual in partnership with other persons

Please provide the contact details for the intiative promoter (the individual or representative of the organisation authorised to represent the intiative).
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Social Media accounts (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, etc.)
- URL: https://www.instagram.com/v.meer_/
  Social media handle and associated hashtag(s): Youtube: Vera Meyer | V. meer || Instagram: @v.meer_
In case my initiative is selected as a finalist of the NEB Prizes 2023, I agree to share the name (individual and/or organisation’s), email address, website and social media accounts indicated above with other NEB Prizes finalists. I also agree to publish the name (individual and/or organisation’s), website and social media accounts indicated above next to the public description of my initiative in the channels of the European Commission.
Yes

How did you hear about the New European Bauhaus Prizes?
Colleagues

Description of the initiative
Please provide a summary of your initiative
MY-CO SPACE is a habitable sculpture made of wood and fungi that invites the sensual reflection and exploration of sustainable ways of living and dwelling on our planet. The load-bearing wooden structure, covered with 330 fungal panels, is intended to make life in the smallest space (analogous to that of a space capsule) and co-habitation with fungi physically tangible. It was built from organic materials and is thus biodegradable. It was designed for the open-air exhibition tinyBE · Living in a Sculpture, which for the first time showed eight habitable sculptures by international artists in Frankfurt’s Metzlerpark and at locations in Darmstadt and Wiesbaden from 26 June to 26 September 2021. The temporary habitability of the sculptures in public spaces in the Frankfurt Rhine-Main metropolitan region was intended to open up a new way of looking at art and life, as visitors could explore the works of art not only during the day but also during overnight stays. The pavillion moved 2022 to the University Library of the Technische Universität Berlin where it can be visited by anyone interested everyday.

MY-CO SPACE is a collaborative work by the interdisciplinary SciArt collective MY-CO-X, developed in collaboration with fungi (lat. mycota), whose unique properties can be made fruitful for solving our global problems today. It enables an artistic-scientific and sensual exploration of the (potential) social significance of fungi for the creation of houses, spaces and places in the not so-distant future.

Please indicate the main themes of your initiative with 5 key words.
circular architecture

Please indicate the main themes of your initiative with key words
fungal biotechnology

Please indicate the main themes of your initiative with key words
building with fungi

Please indicate the main themes of your initiative with key words
citizen science

Please indicate the main themes of your initiative with key words
transdisciplinary research and education

Please give information about the key objectives of your initiative in terms of sustainability and how these have been/will be met. Please highlight how the initiative can be exemplary in this context.
Why building with fungi? As one of the main consumers of finite resources and one of the main producers of climate-damaging greenhouse gases and waste, the construction industry faces unprecedented challenges when it comes to challenging current practices. This applies both to the construction and conversion of existing buildings as well as to the consumption of resources during the use of buildings. A growing population and the associated growing need for construction activities also represent another almost insurmountable challenge for architecture and industry as a whole. Against the background of these major social questions, it is necessary to develop fundamentally new design and planning processes as well as structural-constructive approaches that will lead to a paradigm shift in the way in which materials are used in building.
Through the use of building materials based on fungi, new sustainable but also new technical and aesthetic solutions in construction are conceivable, which offer an alternative paradigm to the state of the art of “intelligent buildings” through biological-based functions such as self-regulation, adaptation, autonomous growth, and self-repair which rely heavily on technical infrastructures. In order to introduce fungal-based materials that are biotechnologically produced from renewable resources (such as renewable plant-based raw materials) into the construction industry, new design, planning and construction methods are required that take into account the properties of the new fungal materials over the entire life cycle of a building. Fungal-based materials and fungal-based houses will pave the way for a circular and sustainable architecture of the future.

Please give information about the key objectives of your initiative in terms of aesthetics and quality of experience for people (through design, positive emotions and cultural benefits) and how these have been met. Please highlight how the initiative can be exemplary in this context.
The sculpture, conceived for use by two people, is a real experimental and experiential space for potential interactions between humans and fungi. Such elementary human needs as shelter were provided by minimal means, comprising mainly fungal materials. The sculpture’s honeycomb walls, for example, were filled with the tinder fungus from the Berlin/Brandenburg region. In the interior, too, visitors sat and slept on fungal materials and fabrics. With the uncompromising nature of solarpunk, the MY-CO-X collective’s projects takes a biomimetic and biophilic approach to the development of future methods and tools that strengthen our resilience and adaptability and are conducive to both coexistence and collective survival. In a kind of homage to the computational, biological and material genius of fungi and their mycelia, it addresses the climate and environmental challenges, the degradations they face, and does so with the help of the human and non-human forces of a collaboratively organised enterprise. In doing so, it harnesses the technologies of both sides for a techno-futuristic, yet fair and utopian life; one grounded in notions of growth reversal and self-sufficiency.
A field report by Ute Warnke from 23 July 2021 is being quoted here as just one example of the many visitors who have undertaken an overnight stay in the sculpture, immersing themselves in multiple worlds of perception: “The exterior resembles a primeval armadillo, while being inside is like living in a toadstool. The smell of fungi filled my nostrils at night, my hand gently stroking the soft, velvety flock of the natural, yet artificial fungal structure. It is an urban art experience of nature – unique, unconventional, and exciting; sounds, smells, a gentle breeze, and the experience of being enveloped in a feeling of deep security in the midst of a frenzied world outside. Thanks to everyone who has made this wonderful, unique, and innovative project possible. A happy start into the day!”

Please give information about the key objectives of your initiative in terms of inclusion (ranging from accessibility and affordability for all to inclusive governing systems, design for all principles or new societal models) and how these have been met. Please highlight how the initiative can be exemplary in this context.
Vera Meyer and Sven Pfeiffer founded the SciArt collective MY-CO-X in summer of 2020 to interweave the scientific, biotechnological and architectural research questions of their teams at the Technische Universität Berlin and the Universität der Künste Berlin, respectively, and to integrate artistic and design-based research approaches. The main driving force behind was the desire to jointly explore new paths for a sustainable built environment and to merge the world of fungi, fungal biotechnology and digital architecture. The second very important aspect for the founders was that the scientific-architectural questions should also include artistic research in order to be able to communicate not only with their own research communities, but also to initiate an intensive exchange with the art field. The desired wish: to establish the collective as a constructive and critical source of ideas for a sustainable bio-based future and to work together on a utopia that could provide some strategies to solve the immense challenges of today. Also, and quite daringly, the declared goal was and is to have designed and built the first “fungal house” by the year 2030. For this purpose, the creative engines science, art and civil society are brought together to enable a collaborative, idealistic action by all participants and thus the realisation of this vision. In the spirit of Jens Jessen: “Idealism here means nothing cloudy, but something quite precise: the orientation towards moral, cognitive and aesthetic norms, in short, towards the good, the true and the beautiful.“
On our MY-CO-X journey, the network of scientists, engineers, architects, artists, designers, and citizen scientists grows continually. Fungi are teachers of all of us, as they are experts in networking and collaboration across species boundaries. They teach us that resources, how limited they may be, can only be harnessed collectively. They taught and teach us humans to put the WE above the I.

Please explain the way citizens benefiting from or affected by the initiative and civil society have been/will be involved in the initiative and what has been/will be the impact of this involvement on the initiative
Fungal-based materials used for the MY-CO SPACE sculpture can be researched, understood, and developed not only in academic or industrial laboratories, but also under DIY conditions. In order to strengthen Berlin’s DIY scene in this field, biotechnologist Vera Meyer initiated together with the artist Erik Göngrich and product designer Nora Wilhelm from Berlin’s MITKUNSTZENTRALE a transdisciplinary teaching and research project in 2021, which aimed to build a bridge between the laboratory of the Department Applied and Molecular Microbiology at TU Berlin (run by Prof. Vera Meyer) and the DIY labs of the House of Materialisation at Berlin’s Alexanderplatz. The aim was to bring DIY enthusiasts together with students from different Berlin Universities to set up a new DIY fungal lab at a special location in the centre of Berlin.
The course, open to anyone interested, is held once a week and aims to adapt the scientific methods and protocols established in an academic laboratory for DIY conditions so that the cultivation of fungi can be easily carried out by civil society. In the independent DIY fungal lab, it should eventually become blurred who is student or lecturer, who is artist or scientist, who is citizen scientist or designer. Knowledge generation at eye level should help all participants to become socially, resource-economically and politically effective.

Please explain how different stakeholders at various levels (local, regional, national, European) were engaged in the design and implementation of the initiative.
The name of the Berlin-based SciArt collective MY-CO-X is etymologically reminiscent to the science of fungi (mycology / Mykologie) both in English and German language, but also go far beyond that. It symbolises the interweaving of three chains of thoughts: how the “I” relates to the world (MY), how we relate to others as living beings (CO) and how we can form a powerful network by coming together to shape our shared world in many ways (X).
MY-CO-X runs three projects so far: The MY-CO BUILD project to investigate and develop building materials made of fungi, the MY-CO SPACE project to create a living space made of fungi, and the MY-CO PLACE project to design an urban place designed by fungi. Also, supporters are involved who financially support or accompany the implementation of these projects. For example, the MY-CO BUILD project (2020–2024) is supported by the Hybrid Platform, a platform of Technische Universität Berlin and Universität der Künste Berlin, as well as the Berlin Futurium. The MY-CO SPACE project (2020/21) was promoted by the Technische Universität Berlin, the Universität der Künste Berlin, the Berlin University Alliance and the non-profit tinyBE society, which brings art, science, and architecture into a dialogue to develop visions for a sustainable way of life. The MY-CO PLACE project (2023) is accompanied by StadtManufaktur Berlin, a laboratory platform of the Technische Universität Berlin that aims to develop future-oriented sustainable solutions for urban transformation in cooperation with the city of Berlin and its inhabitants.
For the implementation of these three projects and as fellow participants in the MY-CO-X collective, many different people are members of the collective since summer 2020: scientists, architects, artists, designers, students of all these disciplines and DIY enthusiasts. We see this diversity as a great opportunity to enable and implement projects that require the most diverse knowledge, skills, but also perspectives.

Please explain which disciplines and/ or knowledge fields were reflected in the design and implementation of your initiative. Please explain how representatives of these different fields interacted with each other, and what the added value of this process was
All MY-CO-X members with a biotechnological background were particularly interested in how our research could be transferred from the very small scale in the laboratory to a much larger, applicable scale and how to support the collective to achieve this. It was also important for them not only to present their new knowledge to the scientific community, as is usually the case, but also to communicate their achievements to society and make them available to it. Members with architectural training were particularly interested in learning about these new fungal-based materialities, experimenting with them and testing their use as innovative building materials. Members from the arts or design, on the other hand, were particularly excited by the idea of working with living materials and saw the accompanying loss of control as a benefit, since the fungus Fomes fomentarius (tinder fungus) used in MY-CO SPACE would, as a co-creative designer, influence the appearance and form of the final work through its own growth behaviour. Everyone in the collective agreed that not only the work on MY-CO SPACE itself, but also the opportunity to participate in a transdisciplinary team that is not hierarchically organised was particularly stimulating and inspiring. A great motivation and an extremely exciting and multifaceted experience for all MY-CO-X members was to co-design a space that enables knowledge transfer while giving all participants the opportunity to learn as well as to teach in equal measure.
The first conceptual considerations for MY-CO SPACE began in March 2020 together with tinyBE curator Cornelia Saalfrank, who thus accompanied the project constructively, critically and very enthusiastically from the very beginning. The digital design for MY-CO SPACE evolved through a continuous exchange of ideas between all participants until a balance was found between what was hoped for digitally and what was feasible analogously.

Please highlight the innovative character of the initiative, when compared to mainstream actions in the field of the initiative
Looking back, we asked ourselves what working on the MY-CO SPACE project had done to everyone involved and asked the collective’s members about their experience. The answers were more than encouraging: The entire endeavour has moved and changed each of us in one way or another. It has provided a space for unlimited and unrestrained creativity with a wide range of tasks. This has also shown some of us the competencies and strengths of themselves and of the others, which many would like to incorporate into future projects. In addition, the work in the collective has encouraged some to work transdisciplinarily in their further professional life, to allow an intense contact between different disciplines and thus to broaden their own view of the world. For many of us it was an absolute broadening of horizons to work with fungi as a living material and to understand and accept nature as a co-designer, but also to realise that fungi of course can never save the world on their own. Likewise, the project inspired many to think outside the box. Especially helpful and exciting were our many conversations with the visitors of tinyBE, as we were thus able to understand how our work is perceived, what people associate with fungi and whether or how they can imagine a future living with fungi at all. But most of all, the transdisciplinary work gave everyone a deep sense of joy and meaning in their work, as everyone shared knowledge and skills and developed themselves in the process. This jointly experienced progress and learning process bonded together, allowed a spirit of community to grow and friendships to develop that go far beyond the MY-CO SPACE project.

Please describe which elements of your initiative could be replicated or transferred to other places, groups of beneficiaries and contexts. This may involve, for example, aspects of the methodology, technology, processes, products, learnings, etc.
As a biotechnologist and artist, I try to merge science and art and attempt such a transdisciplinary synthesis. In the laboratory at the Technische Universität Berlin, in my studio in the Brandenburg forest, in collaboration with my MY-CO-X colleagues from the sciences and the arts, with students, with interested people from civil society. And I experience how much creative power and smart transformation ideas can be unleashed through openness and cooperation across diverse disciplines and subject cultures. With unbridled enthusiasm on the part of all those involved. Because they sense that being heard together allows them to help shaping a sustainable future that can be a future for all.
The potential of fungi for a sustainable, circular and bio-based economy and architecture is enormous, but still untapped. It can, in my opinion, only be fully tapped by the triad of science, art, and society. Therefore, in 2018, I founded the citizen science research project Mind the Fungi, which connected various scientific, artistic and civil society agents from the Berlin area in a two-year transdisciplinary collaboration to collaboratively explore the development of fungal-based biomaterials for the first time and also to bring the importance of fungi and fungal biotechnology for a sustainable future to a wider audience. What was conceived and achieved together, and the lessons learned were reported in our open access book Mind the Fungi, published in 2020. This network has continued to develop, integrating new participants. The fungi themselves played a major role in this process, as their highly developed network structures and interactions and symbioses with other species opened up new spaces for thought and action. The open access book Engage with Fungi (2022, see attachment) reports on these human-human and human-fungi collaborations in the years 2020 to 2022. ALL protocols that were developed for the production of fungal-based materials were published in these books.

Please describe the methodology or approach used in your initiative.
Openness and cooperation across diverse disciplines and cultures are key to success. Transdisciplinary cooperation also means that information, tools, and resources that were previously only available to selected expert groups can now also be used by a wider public and can also be continuously developed and expanded by it. Instead of distributing and limiting special knowledge and expertise to a few authorised specialists only, working in the network becomes the determining element and knowledge and expertise thus become common goods. We consider this development to be significant, because now a citizen scientist understands and designs new materials for architecture or an engineer conducts artistic research and thus optimises a process of nature for a new architecture. Therefore, a new type of architect is also needed, who is not only well-versed in digital planning and design but also experienced in the material science of bio-based materials and able to think and develop architecture in a circular way.
We are convinced that the knowledge that flows into a sustainable and at the same time creatively sophisticated architecture of the future fundamentally requires this cooperation from a growing and vivid network of experts from science, art, architecture, and society. Only if all participants’ expertise and perspectives are equally considered will their built architecture and thus our built environment be truly sustainable. We hope that the MY-CO SPACE pavillion and the Engage with Fungi book are able to arouse curiosity about such transdisciplinary collaborations and inspire the architecture of our future.

Please explain what kind of global challenges the initiative addresses by providing local solutions
The vision that inspires us fungal biotechnologists is that in the not so distant future we will live in houses built with the power of fungi, we will have furniture grown with the help of fungi and we will dress in fungal clothing, as textiles and leather are made of them. These new fungal-based materials and technologies will significantly change the way we live and work and could prove disruptive to some industries. Therefore, we firmly believe that these developments and the associated transformation process must be accompanied by a dialogue with society. In this context, it is the responsibility of us scholars to actively and transparently communicate the why and how to society and to discuss it with them. However, a lively, public-interest-oriented and thus sustainable dynamic will only emerge if, conversely, the outside is also allowed to enter the inside, i.e. if the closed system of science opens up to citizens and they can participate in research projects as citizen scientists or artists-in-residents by conducting independent research, taking measurements, collecting data and thus actively discussing and shaping scientific research projects from the very beginning.
We address the achievement of our goals on the three levels of technology, society and education. These levels are not considered separately from each other, but intertwined. This holistic approach aims to actively involve individuals and actors from Berlin society, the arts and higher education institutions in the implementation of fungal-based research with economic and ecological significance and to jointly initiate social development and transformation processes based on this, which are of high relevance to climate policy.

Please detail the scope of progress in the implementation of the initiative. This can include already demonstrated results/outputs related to the chosen Prizes category, and the already achieved benefits from the initiative for direct and indirect beneficiaries. This can also include a development plan of the initiative, with a particular attention to the steps envisaged in the year following the application, and including envisaged results and benefits from the initiative
The MY-CO-X collective has published in the course of exhibiting the habitable MY-CO SPACE pavillion in Frankfurt/Main and Berlin several broschures, books, videos, scientific publications and online tutorials as open access. These are meant to make all protocols, methods, visions and thoughts open to the public and to invite the civil society to join this endevour. To keep the audience as broad as much as possible, a new YouTube channel (Vera Meyer | V. meer) and an instagram account (@v.meer_) were set up.

Please click the following links for selected main (scientific) publications and videos:
- https://www.v-meer.de/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/s40694-022-00137-8.pdf
- https://www.v-meer.de/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/meyer-et-al-iop-conf-series-2022.pdf
- https://www.v-meer.de/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/engage-with-fungi-book-2022.pdf
- https://www.v-meer.de/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/my-co-space-broschure-2022.pdf
- https://www.v-meer.de/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/my-co-build-broschuere-2022.pdf
- https://www.v-meer.de/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/sharma-and-meyer-fbb-2022.pdf
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqtHN3ZC6xY&t=188s
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PwASy34yQZ8&t=24s
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmLZouDokDs&t=80s
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rygnsEiIrgw&t=18s
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mz4cqT64Cmg&t=90s

Please provide documents that demonstrate the maturity level of the initiative and commitment to implement the initiative in practice (e.g.: evaluation report, final or mid-term initiative report, certification, publications, building permit, grant agreement, letter of support, partnership agreement, etc.)
PDF
PDF
- pdf-1-10072.pdf
- pdf-1-10072_0.pdf
If relevant, please describe how your initiative contributes to developing new competences, especially in the context of the European competence framework on sustainability.
I believe that our transdisciplinary endeavour that is open to science, the arts, design and civil society is a sustainable endeavour.
As a scientist and a citizen, I am firmly convinced that we have to face the major challenges of today collectively and that we can only solve them collectively. We must learn to think transdisciplinarily and to work transdisciplinarily. Following the philosopher Jürgen Mittelstraß, transdisciplinarity means „that science or research frees itself from its subject-specific, disciplinary boundaries and defines its problems with a view to non-scientific, social developments in order to solve these problems independently of disciplines and subjects.” In my opinion, this means that all creativity engines, that is the sciences, the arts and civil society, must be brought together so that each of the different perspectives on the here and now as well as on tomorrow can be heard. Because the big picture can only be grasped together. And solutions that are jointly developed will be sustainable.
Please attach at least 6 high resolution images or visual representations of your initiative to your application.
If you would like to upload additional documentation, please upload or write below.
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By submitting your application you confirm that you are the copyright owner of the images provided and that they can be used by the European Commission for the purposes of promoting the New European Bauhaus on all platforms (websites, print, social media and other).
Yes

By ticking this box, you declare that you are not in in one or more of the exclusion situations foreseen under Article 136 of the Financial Regulation.
Yes

By submitting this application, I declare that I am not related to the entities subject to EU restricted measures under Article 29 of the Treaty on the European Union (TEU) and subject to Article 215 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU (TFEU)1, and entities covered by Commission Guidelines No 2013/C 205/05), which are not eligible to participate in any capacity.
Yes

By ticking this box, you declare that all the information provided in this form is factually correct, that you assume sole liability in the event of a claim relating to the activities carried out in the framework of the contest, that the proposed initiative has not been proposed for the New European Bauhaus Prizes in any other category or strand and that it has not been subject to any type of investigation, which could lead to a financial correction because of irregularities or fraud.
Yes

By submitting your application, you guarantee that you are the author or have the rights to proceed with the application and to authorise the use of the initiative and that you have obtained any necessary consents, licenses or assignments from third parties and included copyright notices when necessary
Yes

By submitting your application, you understand that all the applications that meet the eligibility requirements will be shared for the purposes of the selection processes, and notably published on the secured platform prizes.new-european-bauhaus.eu and for the purposes of the promotion of these on the New European Bauhaus website and/or other European Commission communication channels. In this sense, the applications would be widely available. Applicants should ensure that they present their initiatives, initiative, in such a way that they could be shared without giving rise to intellectual property related concerns. If your submission is selected as one of the finalists, it will additionally be shared for the purpose of the public vote that will take place. The European Union is granted a licence to use and share your application with the general public and the official external experts for the purposes of the selection process, including the voting. The European Union has the right to use the images and visual materials and the description provided in the application for communication purposes related to the contest and beyond. Rights granted comprise the right to store, reproduce, display, publish and communicate or distribute copies in electronic or digital format, including, but not only, through the internet. Unless you have disclosed your name, the European Commission has no obligation to share your name when using or disseminating your contribution to the public. The European Union cannot be held responsible in case any submitted initiative, initiative is found to infringe third party’s rights. The European Union shall be neither responsible for the use that third parties may do of the applications or related content.
Yes

By submitting your application, you acknowledge that you read and understand that the ‘Guide to Applicants’ of the NEB Prizes 2023, available online in the website of the NEB Prizes 2023, is an integral part of this application form and that it must therefore be observed when completing and submitting your application.
Yes