EcoLogic Alliance

EcoLogic Alliance — Small intervention, large systematic change

Advancing nature-based and regenerative systems.

EcoLogic Alliance builds strategic partnerships and pilot projects that translate knowledge into scalable solutions — across sectors, and across geographies.

Living Material01 Research-to-Industry02 Next Generation Designers03 Collaborative Community04
Aerial view of coral atolls and turquoise reef flats scattered across deep ocean in the Maldives.

We work across four dimensions of one methodology.

01Living Material

Grown, not manufactured.

Close view of tessellated building components cast from shell waste.
Shell-waste building components — Shell We Dance?, 2024

Materials that grow, bind, adapt and degrade productively — tested from the scale of a sand grain to a building component, and designed to return to the ecosystem at end of life.

02Research-to-Industry
The Pioneering Biomaterials exhibition at CCA: material samples suspended on lines above workbenches of prototypes.
Pioneering Biomaterials: Academia and Industry Convergence — CCA, with Autodesk Research

With biomaterials, scalability matters.

This dimension builds the route — convening academia and industry, and testing the economy and scalability of the solutions with the people who would have to make them.

Pioneering Biomaterials 2025 symposium →
  • CCA Architectural Ecologies LabCo-organizer
  • CCA Digital Craft LabCo-organizer
  • Autodesk ResearchCo-organizer
03Next Generation Designers

Student work that becomes field work.

Each year a team from CCA and UCSF carries a material question from the laboratory to a working prototype. ShoreThing began here — it is now one of three projects heading to the Maldives.

Interior lined with mycelium insulation panels and bio-clay tiles. 2026

Living MATTERS

Homes grown from reclaimed lumber, mycelium insulation and a bio-clay shell.

Emergent Voice Winner Cast shell units along a shoreline. 2025

ShoreTHING

Bio-cemented shells placed in inter-tidal zones to accrete sand.

Outstanding Science Winner Components cast from shell waste. 2024

Shell We Dance?

Egg and shellfish waste as a component-based building system.

Outstanding Science Winner Ribbed earthen vault with a circular oculus. 2023

BacTerra

Biomineralization across scales with clay, bacteria and urchin shells.

Outstanding Field Research Winner
04Collaborative Community

One atoll. Three experiments. One living laboratory.

The 2027 International Maldives Research Forum runs three projects in parallel with the Maldives Coral Institute and Maldives National University — on islands where the problem is not theoretical.

99%of national territory is ocean
1,100coral islands, none above 1.5m
186of those islands inhabited
78rural islands facing severe erosion

You cannot negotiate with the laws of science.

Mohamed Nasheed — former President of the Maldives

Plankton captured by the PlanktoScope.
Citizen Oceanography

PlanktoPod

Evan Jones & Adam Larson, PhD

An autonomous floating platform giving communities the means to test their own water. A buoyant enclosure carries sensors and houses the open-source PlanktoScope, imaging plankton, coral health and microplastics between 10 and 500 micrometres.

  • Margaret Ikeda — CCA
  • William Kreysler — Kreysler & Associates
  • Prakash Lab — Stanford
  • FairScope
Woven coconut coir basket structure.
Fish Habitat

Reef Weave

Kamille Hammerstrom, MS & John Oliver, PhD

A nature-based alternative to coral fragmentation, piloted where dredging and repeated bleaching have destroyed reef habitat. Woven baskets wrap dock pilings, built with the same skills Maldivian weavers already use for palm thatch.

  • Margaret Ikeda & Evan Jones — CCA
  • Ibrahim Mohamed, PhD
  • Moss Landing Marine Laboratories
Cast shell forms arrayed across a white sand shoreline in the Maldives, with people working at the water's edge.
Shoreline Defence

Shore Thing

Alain Goriely, PhD & Negar Kalantar, PhD

Geometric shells cast from coral beach sand, coconut coir and a safe bacterium, placed in the inter-tidal zone to dissipate currents and accrete sand — then degrade productively back into the ecosystem.

  • Dyche Mullins, PhD — UCSF
  • Gábor Domokos, PhD — Budapest
  • Anastasia H. Muliana, PhD — Texas A&M
  • Ahmed Fariz Nizar — MNU
TeamFounders
Margaret Ikeda

Margaret Ikeda

Architecture × Ecology × Material Systems

Associate Professor of Architecture and Interiors and Co-Director of the Architectural Ecologies Lab, across cross-disciplinary research and applied prototyping.

Negar Kalantar

Negar Kalantar, PhD

Computational Design × Biology × Material Science

Associate Professor and Co-Director of the Digital Craft Lab at California College of the Arts, from acoustic installations to large-scale 3D-printed infrastructure.

Evan Jones

Evan Jones

Architecture × Practice × Environmental Systems

Practicing architect and Senior Adjunct Faculty at CCA, Co-Director of the Architectural Ecologies Lab, focused on ecological and regenerative systems.

NetworkCollaborators
Research Leads
  • Alain Goriely, PhDOCIAM, University of Oxford
  • John Oliver, PhDMoss Landing Marine Laboratories
  • Kamille Hammerstrom, MSMoss Landing Marine Laboratories
  • Adam Larson, PhDData Analyst
  • Dyche Mullins, PhDUC San Francisco
  • Gábor Domokos, PhDBudapest University of Technology
  • Anastasia H. Muliana, PhDTexas A&M University
Advisors & Consultants
  • Ibrahim Mohamed, PhDSpecialist in Environmental Sciences
  • Richard L. Rundell, FAIAFounder & Principal Advisor, Track 5
  • Ignacio BarandiaranPrincipal, Arup, San Francisco
  • Isha FathmathDORIC Architects, Malé
  • Shaukath IbrahimFormer Council Member, Ukulhas
  • Mohamed Maujood HussainHospitality, Rashdoo
  • William KreyslerPresident, Kreysler & Associates
Labs & Organizations
  • Maldives Coral InstituteHost institution
  • Maldives National UniversityHost institution
  • Architectural Ecologies LabCalifornia College of the Arts
  • Digital Craft LabCalifornia College of the Arts
  • Prakash LabStanford University
  • Mullins LabUC San Francisco
  • Autodesk Technology CenterSan Francisco
  • Biodesign ChallengeNew York
ContactWork with us

Interested in collaborating?

negar@ecologicalliance.org Negar margaret@ecologicalliance.org Margaret evan@ecologicalliance.org Evan