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Spring at the Regenerative Design Lab

20 people sit in a circle.

The chairs are arranged between seven oak trees, right at the edge of Hazel Hill Wood — the home of the Regenerative Design Lab.

20 chairs in a circle by the Gatekeeper tree at Hazel Hill Wood

It’s a deliberate place to start. For many, it’s the first time meeting each other face to face. And the first time meeting the wood.

Because the wood isn’t just a venue. It’s part of the work.

A thriving ecosystem. A container for learning. A place for discovery. A reminder of abundance, complexity, and timescales far beyond our projects.

And so we begin our inquiries here — deliberately stepping away from the pressing needs of day-to-day work, and into something slower, more exploratory.

Lab participants gather around the fire to discuss how regenerative design relates to their work — photo credit, Steve Cross

We don’t pretend the real world works like this. But this is a place we can return to — for perspective, recovery, and renewed energy to carry on the work of system change.

Everyone arrives with a Pattern from the Pattern Book, chosen as a guide through the Lab.

Over the first afternoon, we move through the wood. Three distinct habitats, each chosen to represent a different regenerative mindset. Each paired with a simple game and time for reflection.

Two lab members in discussion during one of our exercises exploring mindsets for regenerative design — photo credit, Steve Cross

Some of the work is quiet. Observing. Noticing.

Some of it is more active — testing ideas, asking questions, beginning to see how each person’s inquiry might take shape.

And some of it is unexpectedly playful.

There are moments of seriousness — conversations about organisations, systems, and the challenges of making change stick.

And then, at other times, we find ourselves in something like satsuma jousting.

Delicious food and lots of it — a key ingredient of the residentials at Hazel Hill Wood.

It’s easy to see these as opposites. But in practice, they are part of the same work. Play creates space. It changes how people relate. It allows new ideas to emerge that wouldn’t surface otherwise.

By the second day, the focus turns more directly to each person’s inquiry.

We work with the Systems Bookcase, exploring how different levels of a system interact — from underlying paradigms through to design decisions.

Two people on a reflective walk along a path at Hazel Hill Wood — photo credit, Steve Cross

Then back out into the wood again — in pairs, and then alone.

  • Why have I come here?
  • Within this broad area of interest, what am I actually curious about?
  • What pattern am I working with?
  • And what might I try next?
Lab facilitator Ellie Osborne lists four reflective questions for the solo walk in the woods — photo credit, Steve Cross

These aren’t intended to be final answers, rather, best next answers for now.

By the end, the group leaves the shelter of the wood and returns to their projects, organisations, and everyday constraints.

But not quite in the same way.

Because now we are observing, asking questions, looking for opportunities, looking for the lever that we will pull, the change that we will experiment with.

We’ll gather again here in the summer to share what we have discovered so far.

Cohort 6 at the end of their spring residential — photo credit, Steve Cross
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A quiet reset

The rhythm of the Regenerative Design Lab is loosely pinned to the cycles of the moon.

Not because we think it has any mystical power over the work. But because we are interested in creating a culture that pays attention to the living world — noticing what it’s doing, and what signals it might be offering. When to speed up. When to slow down. When to lean in, and when to sit back.

This kind of ecological participation — an interest in, and participation in, how living systems work — sits at the heart of regenerative design.

In the Pattern Book for Regenerative Design, we introduced a simple device called the Lunar Sprint. It’s a way of structuring creative work around the phases of the moon.

In many sectors, it’s now common to work in sprints — bursts of energy followed by moments of pause and reflection. The Lunar Sprint takes that idea and pins it to something visible in the physical world. Something that shifts, whether or not we’re paying attention.

In this cycle, the full moon becomes a moment of showing up.

A point for sharing, publishing, or coming together. Where possible, we’ve timed Lab gatherings with the full moon — a moment where we account for ourselves, and our intentions to make change.

Between these peaks sits the new moon.

A quieter point. A reset.

Not a time for planning in detail, but for reconnecting with intention. For stepping away from practicalities, and returning to the question of what we actually care about.

At this point in the cycle, we ask:

– What am I curious about?

– Where do I feel constrained?

– What do I dream of doing this sprint?

From this moment of reset, we can let go of what didn’t happen last time.

And begin again.

In the days that follow, those ideas may turn into plans. Actions. Deliverables. But at this darkest point in the cycle, the aim is not productivity.

It’s direction. I don’t think the moon is doing anything to the work.

But it is doing something to our attention. And that feels like something to pay attention to.

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New moon hack

Regular readers will probably know I often think about how we can use the moon cycle as a sprint map for personal and professional creative projects. It’s part of a wider aim to integrate living systems into our culture. 

More specifically, this idea revolves around cycling between moments of quiet imagination and dreaming and moments of very active delivery in preparation and follow-up. One of the things that I like about the moon cycles is that they are out of sync with the months and even the year. These dissonances create clashes and overlaps that make every year different, which I find interesting. 

However, the more tricky thing is spending time figuring out when the new moon and the full moon will be and matching task tasks up with this.

For example, I wanted to set up a reminder in my professional workflow to carry out a certain creative task around the new moon to do with imagining and dreaming. In Trello, you can set up reminders to be monthly, weekly, or daily but not with the cycles of the moon.

So I had a bit of fun this afternoon creating a workaround. First, I found a lunar calendar ICS file, from GitHub, which I could subscribe to on a Google Calendar. That puts the new moon in my calendar. Next, I set up a workflow in Zapier that triggers every time there is a new moon in my calendar to set up a Trello card that instructs me to do a new creative brainstorm. I tested it, and hey presto, it appears exactly where I want it.

Of course. The back up if the tech doesn’t work is to just look out the window at night and get reminded that way!

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Still learning about feedback

This week I was teaching conflict in design teams on the Sustainability Leadership for the Built Environment course in Cambridge.

One small realisation in the session has stuck with me.

The model of feedback I’ve been teaching*— setting criteria, asking permission, enquiring into responses — is essentially a collaborative model. It relies on both people being interested: in the work, and in each other’s thinking.

The alternative is something quite different.

In a more competitive mode, one person asserts a view on their own terms, and the other responds by defending. There’s less interest in understanding, and more focus on holding position.

Both show up in practice. But they lead to very different conversations.

What I noticed in the room is how easily we slip away from both — into something softer, where feedback is diluted to avoid discomfort.

Which probably explains why this remains difficult.

One of the things I appreciate about teaching this material is that it never quite settles. Each session reveals something new about how these dynamics actually play out.

Still more to learn.

*I learnt this technique from Nick Zienau on his excellent Leading and Influencing training.

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How to resuscitate a brief – stage 3

The final stage in our brief resuscitation process is to test it. We test a design brief by developing ideas in response.

When we do this we may discover: 

  • Zero solution — when we add up all the requirements and discover there isn’t a way to meet them all. We need to loosen the constraints.
  • The ideas are unambitious — ideas that meet the requirements of the brief don’t achieve very much then maybe the brief is too limiting
  • The ideas are uninspiring — when we come up with ideas that meet the brief but fail to delight, it may be that the brief stipulates the minimum that should be achieved, rather than provoking the heights we should be aiming for.
  • The brief missed the point — sometimes we stumble upon ideas that don’t meet the brief, but would be a good idea in any case. In which case maybe the original brief missed the point, and a better outcome is possible by changing the assumptions.

Ultimately the brief and the ideas should match, but the two evolve to reach compatibility. Coupling a brief with the ideas it enables helps us to ask questions that challenge the brief, and keep it moving – that keep it alive. 

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How to resuscitate a brief — stage 2

The second way to breathe life into a design brief is to remind ourselves that it was never as complete as it originally sounded.

We do this by exploring the Five Elements of a Design Brief:

  • The explicit – what is actually written.
  • The implicit – what is meant by what is written
  • The assumed – what is assumed in the writing and in the reading. 
  • The missing – what the brief writer forgot to tell you. 
  • The unknown – what the writer didn’t include in the brief because they hadn’t realised they wanted it yet.

In practice, read the brief aloud, slowly. For each sentence, ask:

  • What is explicit here?
  • What is implicit?
  • What is assumed?
  • What is missing?
  • What might be unknown?

The questions test both our understanding of the brief, and also whether we have the right requirements. And open to the door evolving the brief. 

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How to resuscitate a design brief – stage 1

Design briefs become lifeless when we treat them as fixed, and unchanging.

We bring life to them when we allow them to evolve.

The first stage is to make your design brief a live, editable document (with changes tracked if necessary).

The brief should prompt questions – write those down on the brief.

New requirements will be discovered – add those in so they don’t get lost.

New possibilities for what you want emerge – note these down too.

Gather the people who care about the brief to review these changes, challenge or approve them.

A living brief is one that is being worked on.

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Is your brief dead?

You are midway through a project. Ask yourself, has my design brief changed, or has it stayed the same.

If it hasn’t changed, then you should check if your design brief is very nearly, or very actually, dead.

A lifeless brief breathes no life into the design process

A brief without a pulse clings to its original constraints without shifting the boundaries.

An ex-brief is one that looks nothing like what you are working on.

A stiff brief is unmoved by new discoveries made during the design process.

A deceased brief ceases to be of any use.

If you suspect these symptoms then your brief needs urgent resuscitation. Because in design, a healthy brief is alive.

(It is possible that you brief may just be resting, in which case you need to wake it up).

[With apologies to Monty Python’s “Dead Parrot” sketch]

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The living brief

This week, I’ve been updating and consolidating my writing on design briefs. The design brief is a fundamental component of the design process, and it is a core topic in our design teaching.

But I realise in gathering together my writing that there is an idea I have been dancing around without naming it.

A design brief is not something that is static that we define at the start of a project. It is something that evolves, and grows as part of the design process.

I’ve started to call this the Living Brief. And you can read all about it here.

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A conversation with Hazel Hill Wood

At Hazel Hill Wood, we treat the place not just as a setting but an active participant in the work. A practice I learnt there is, on arrival, to tell the wood what I have come to do.

What follows is a reflection on that practice (first published on the Hazel Hill site) and a question that is an underlying motivation in my work on regenerative design.

A practice I learnt from Alan Heeks, the founder of Hazel Hill Trust, is, on arrival, to tell the wood what I had come here to do. And so I sat down this morning, by the Gatekeeper tree to share a fairy ordinary to-do list. But as I started, something else came out. 

The following is a transcript of that conversation with the wood.

It is hard to know if you want us here. All the people that come. Would it be better off if we stayed away? I am not attuned enough to the signals from the wood to be able to sense the answer. 

So I come at the question from a different angle. 

Ecosystems show us that every component evolves to play a part. Not survival of the fittest but survival of the whole. The system evolves to maximise the life-fullness that is possible within those limits. 

Humans have evolved as part of ecosystems, have evolved to play a part. To live well, even, in harmony with the rest of life. 

And yet, in much of the Global North, we seem to have drifted away from that relationship. At a societal level, we no-longer live in strong relation with or pay much attention to this wider pattern of life. So that our collective actions serve to deplete rather than enhance the ecosystems of which we are part. 

You are a place to help restore that relationship. A small node in a much wider movement of people who want to establish and mainstream a different relationship between humans and the rest of the living world. A relationship of attention, care and mutual thriving. 

At Hazel Hill Wood people can come to discover or rediscover their relationship with the living world. And can find healing and wellbeing through connecting with this wider web of life. 

When we are here we will treat you with respect. 

We will play an active part in seeking to grow the life-fullness of this place. 

And we will bring people under the boughs of your canopy, so that they can take what they learn here and create wider influence wherever they come from. 

To return to where I started, I cannot tell what you think of all of this, but I hope that our intrusion on the peace and tranquility of this place can have a positive impact here, and on ecosystems further afield. 

And I hope that you feel this is worthwhile. In the meantime, I’ll continue trying to listen out for an answer.