Ep. 213: The Quiet Rebellion of Biodesigner Natsai Audrey Chieza
Natsai Audrey Chieza spent her youth in Zimbabwe in a close-knit extended family where she and her cousins were “in each others’ pockets.” In her teenage years the national economy crashed, necessitating a family relocation to the UK, and she began learning the skill of “not belonging.” Architecture studies proved alienating so she found a way to combine them with her love of fashion (to the consternation of her professors.) Rejecting the prescribed path of a professional architect, she instead pursued a postgraduate program in Material Futures that set her on a path of designing with bacteria.
Now, she’s founded Faber Futures, a biodesign studio, and Normal Phenomena of Life, an artful lifestyle and fashion brand that also functions as a working prototype of a new model bioeconomy. She’s spent her whole life quietly not doing what was expected of her, and in this space of outsiderness she’s been very busy creating new paradigms for how we might collaborate with nature and new models for the equitable stewardship of these new biotechnologies. So, in terms of cultural infrastructure, she is an architect after all!
What’s the best advice that you’ve ever gotten?
There’s only one you.
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What’s your current favorite tool or material to work with?
My three year old daughter is giving me plenty of source material across all domains of my life. She is teaching me things so profound that I could never have known without her coming into our lives.
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What book is on your nightstand?
“When We Are Seen” by Denise Young, former Chief of Human Resources at Apple.
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Favorite restaurant in your city?
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Who do you look up to and why?
The matriarchs in my family. They are the original world builders.
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What are the last five songs you listened to?
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