Authors: Leyla Yunis, Laura Valadez

Team members: Carlos Daniel Cardenas, David Jesús Garza Avalos, Emiliano Munguía Villarreal, Laura Angélica Valadez Rojas, Leyla Yunis, Marbet Iran Aguilar Hidrogo, Ondrej Kyjánek, Saad Akhtar Chinoy, Selena Pere, Susana Scott Ayala

As part of the Fab City Challenge, Innovaction Gym and LABNL hosted the BiodiverCities Challenge. During a 10-day stay, international makers worked alongside the “regiomontanos” to explore how Monterrey’s citizens can coexist harmoniously with the rich biodiversity thriving amidst their mountainous landscape.

After months of virtual meetings, brainstorming sessions, and cumulative jetlag, the group of engineers, architects, designers, students, biologists and makers coming from Singapore, France, the Czech Republic, the USA and México with very diverse backgrounds, took on the challenge of finding a way to bring their skills together and create something meaningful. The adrenaline, excitement and most importantly, the willingness to help and build things together, made this an exciting prospective.

Guided by local biodiversity activists, the team ventured into Monterrey’s mountains and rivers: walking along Río Santa Catarina and hiking on La Estanzuela Natural Park, while listening to these places’ history and their connection to people’s daily life. Experiencing and hearing the locals’ stories broadened our comprehension and got us thinking about supporting and expanding existing initiatives.

The project brought together local communities like Viaje al Microcosmos, Sonidos de la Noche, Ayuguara, and Por un senderismo sustentable y responsable. Their participation added a rich flavor to the project, ensuring that efforts were grounded in real needs and aspirations.

Every resource available was used: paper, online platforms, boards, laser cutters, and various meeting spaces, from vibrant taquerías to formal coworking spaces, but it wasn’t until the decision to focus on a 1:1 prototype was made, that ideas began to narrow down. Setting aside teleportation portals and concentrating on concrete ideas, the mini museum designed to combine and present engaging, informative content began to take shape; and as ideas solidified, more communities and individuals joined in.

Co-creating texts, didactic tools, and educational methods around biodiversity enriched the team’s understanding of Monterrey, revealing things they hadn’t imagined, like how little digital fabrication input allowed local communities to generate impactful public engagement and citizen science activities. All they needed to do was help these communities bring their visions to life. 3D printers were brought in from local homes to produce parts, while some team members focused on improving existing citizen science tools. The list of participants seemed endless, with new volunteers joining every hour.

The mini museum was completed and packed with the aid of shoeboxes that perfectly fit the modular design. The final product was wrapped at the airport and sent to Puebla. A four-piece mini museum that integrates associations and tools, arrived safely to be showcased at FAB24.

The BiodiverCities Challenge didn’t just produce a mini museum, it created a network of biodiversity initiatives that will continue to spread, it helped to develop digital fabrication skills and empowered communities to continue creating tools aimed to increase awareness and understanding of ecosystem conservation as well as the importance of our relationship with nature. Mobio became the snowball that will hopefully continue to roll and grow a stronger network of biodiversity-friendly people.