Designing Cities as Living Systems: Biomimicry, Systems Thinking, and the Amsterdam City Doughnut

As cities confront climate change, resource constraints, and social inequity, traditional planning models—often organized around isolated sectors—are proving insufficient. Increasingly, urban leaders are turning to systems thinking and biomimicry, learning from how living systems balance resilience, regeneration, and limits over time.

This course examines the Amsterdam City Doughnut as a leading example of biomimicry applied at the city scale. Developed through collaboration between the Doughnut Economics Action Lab, Biomimicry 3.8, Circle Economy, and C40 Cities, the framework provides a holistic lens for understanding urban health—aligning social foundations with ecological ceilings at both local and global scales.

Rather than focusing solely on individual buildings or technologies, the course reframes the city as a living system defined by flows of energy, materials, water, mobility, governance, and social equity. Participants will explore how Amsterdam translated systems thinking into practical policy direction, circular economy strategies, and climate leadership.

To ground these concepts in measurable performance, the course also introduces LEED for Cities and Communities (v4.1) as an established rating system used by jurisdictions worldwide to track and verify sustainability progress. By comparing the City Doughnut framework with LEED for Cities, learners gain insight into how values-based systems thinking can align with performance-based certification tools. This course connects biomimicry principles with urban governance, climate leadership, resilience planning, and measurable sustainability frameworks. It is designed for planners, architects, engineers, policymakers, sustainability professionals, and public-sector leaders working at the scale of cities and regions.