Melissa Sterry is founder of the Panarchistic Architecture paradigm — a seminal approach to designing built environments that not only survive, but thrive, in wildfire-prone regions. With a PhD from the Advanced Virtual and Technological Architecture Research (AVATAR) group at the School of Architecture and Landscape at University of Greenwich, London, her groundbreaking research explores how the biochemistries, behaviours, structures, and ecologies of fire-adapted species can inform resilient and regenerative architectural, urban, and landscape design, planning, and policy.

At the heart of Dr. Sterry’s work is a question central to our increasingly fire-prone future, ‘Can we learn to live with wildfire, not against it?’ Her answer, refined over more than a decade of rigorous transdisciplinary inquiry, is a resounding yes.

Synthesising knowledge from fields including ecology, fire science, bio-inspired design, engineering, materials, and systems theory, her Panarchistic Architecture model, advances biomimetics from individual organisms to whole ecosystems - ecomimicry. Inspired by insights from an stay in the fire-prone hills of San Diego County in 1997, during which she first learned of fire ecology, Dr. Sterry designed and funded her PhD research programme, which initiated in 2010 at University of Salford’s School of the Built Environment (SOBE), she completed under the supervision of Prof. Neil Spiller at Greenwich in 2018.

Supported by her wider research into building resilience to major meteorological geological, and ecological disruptions, this systems-led methodology proposes novel adaptive material and information systems that mimic the dynamics of pyrophytic (fire-adapted) flora and fauna. Designed to align with the severity, frequency, and behaviour of local fire regimes, these innovations present compelling possibilities for architecture, urban design, planning, and policymaking at a time when the risks posed by wildfires to those living and working in the wildland-urban-interface are rising rapidly.

Dr. Sterry has led multiple enquiries into the potential of nature-informed, inspired, and enabled design, production, and innovation. She undertook her first exploration in the field between 1994 - 1995, when she created the seminal concept in biomaterial apparel for safe decomposition into the environment - biocompostable fashion, while still an undergraduate. Between 2008–2010 she ran award-winning interdisciplinary collaborative innovation programme New Frontiers, which provided opportunities and stimulus for new sustainable design. During that time she explored how fields including biomimetics and biotechnology could shape the future of the built environment.

Invited to present Panarchistic Architecture in a masterclass atop The Monument in 2017, as part of the national commemoration of the 350th anniversary of the Great Fire of London, her design research has been published in the likes of the Routledge companions to Ecological Design Thinking, and Smart Design Thinking in Archicture and Urbanism, for which she authored the chapters on design for building wildfire resilience.

A fellow of the Design Research Society and Institute of Science and Technology, chartered scientist with the Science Council, and member of the Design Council expert network and of the National Coalition of Independent Scholars, Dr. Sterry is also the founder of biofutures consultancy Bioratorium® (est. 2019), and Bionic City® (est. 2010) – the first initaitive to explore ‘how nature would design a city’.

Her post-PhD research and publishing platform, Panarchic Codex®, hosts an extensive collection of her work, including digital, print, film, and audio educational resources, speculative building codes, design concepts, field and lab notes, interviews, and public outreach materials that bring cutting-edge research into accessible, open-access formats. These and other digital resources, including her Design for Wildfire magazine - which has over 50,000 followers, serve both academic and industry audiences, and communities looking to better understand and adapt to fire-prone environments.

Since completing her PhD, Dr. Sterry has completed several field trips, including to the site that first inspired her bio-inspired design for living with wildfire research. She has further advanced both the paradigm itself and its applications, including the creation of sub-classes including Pyrophytic Architecture™ and Xerophytic Architecture™ - the former focused on wildfire, the latter on aridity and heat.

Working in collaboration with commercial partners, Dr. Sterry is also developing original design concepts which, turning pyrophytes into prototypes, she concieved during her PhD studies. Provisionally outlined in works including her thesis (2018), peer-reviewed chapters, and presentations, they include BIOroot™ System (subsurface hybridised data sensing, processing, actuating, and storage network that tracks environmental metrics including biotic moisture and atmospheric humidity levels); Pyri-CONE™ (autonomous wildfire sensing, processing, and actuating device that, mimicking a pinecone of the pyriscence variant - from which she coined its name, is activated by chemical, heat, and other environmental signatures of wildfires); and Retardant BIObark™ (exterior wall-plating system modelled on fire-retardant rhytidome, which dissipates heat from wildfires to help protect structures).

Currently, Dr. Sterry is developing Design for Wildfire School, which launching in 2025, is a pioneering pop-up meets virtual education initiative offering interdisciplinary training in nature-inspired architectural, urban, and landscape design for building resilience to wildfire. Working with transatlantic partners, including leading research and education institutions, as well as laboratories and startups developing edge technologies in sensing, computing, materials, and engineering, the school will offer courses, field trips, and masterclasses, conduct collaborative research, and create conceptual showcases.

Through workshops, keynotes, and tailored consultations, she also helps organisations embed bio-inspired design and innovation, and wildfire and wider hazard resilience into their strategic frameworks, while offering ongoing opportunities for collaboration, research, and public engagement. Her past clients include the likes of the World Bank, Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR), Future Cities Catapult (Innovate UK), the Canadian Insitute of Planners, and the Future of Architecture and Building conclave.

Dr. Sterry has numerous affiliations with leading academic and research institutions in the fields of design, architecture, science, engineering, and innovation. Her past and present roles include visiting lecturer, critic, external examiner, thesis supervisor, peer-review, and assembly member at several distinguished research-led universities including The Bartlett, Central Saint Martins, AA School of Architecture and the Institute of Advanced Architecture of Catalonia (IaaC). A guest professor with Professors without Borders, she is also a member of EEL (extraordinary.experimental.laboratory).

An evaluator of Conservation X Labs Grand Fire Challege, she has held numerous finalist juror roles with prestigous design, architecture, and sustainability awards worldwide, including the Silbersalz Science & Media Awards. Widely published and frequently interviewed by leading global media, she has an estimated reach of over 150M across her career.

Concerned at the high levels of research plagiarism, intellectual property theft, and misappropriation in research in science, wider STEM, design, and innovation, Dr. Sterry recently cofounded the Original Minds, Rightful Credit campaign. Supported by a growing community of experts from fields including IP law, public relations, research, education, and communications, the campaign aims to raise visibility of these issues and their impacts to individuals, disciplines, and wider society.

Bringing together a rare confluence of scientific rigour, creative vision, and deep ecological understanding, Dr. Melissa Sterry continues to pioneer pathways towards a future in which humanity coexists dynamically and sustainably with wildfire. Her work challenges conventional thinking, offering not only pioneering strategies for adapting our built environments, but also a broader cultural and philosophical reframing of our relationship with fire and the landscapes it shapes.

As the climate and wider environmental crisis accelerates and wildfires grow in scale and intensity, her transdisciplinary leadership in this field mobilises knowledge, innovation, and community to build a world that is not merely fire-resilient, but fire-adaptive by regenerative design. Explore some of her Design for Wildfire works here.

Images below: Dr. Sterry presenting her design for wildfire research keynotes at events in London, Belgrade, Ottawa, and Mumbai; and a satellite image of a forest fire in Oregan, USA shown in infrared view, using modified Copernicus Sentinel data processed by Pierre Markuse.