From underwater to underground

Zena Holloway is a living systems designer and the founder of Rootfull.
She is a self-taught underwater photographer with a career spanning over 25 years, producing photographic editions and global campaigns for international clients. (www.zenaholloway.com)

While working in the oceans, she became acutely aware of the true depth of the plastic crisis and in 2018, she began researching biomaterials, first mycelium and then plant root. She pioneered a method of guiding root using beeswax templates to grow a new class of living materials. The process is a collaboration with nature, a meditation on time, growth, and transformation that invites a closer look at the infinitely renewable power of plants and our relationship to the Earth.

Holloway’s work has been widely celebrated, both for her evocative underwater photography and for her practice of merging design with biological innovation. As a living systems designer, she is the recipient of a Queen Elizabeth Craft Scholarship (QEST), a UK Innovate Creative Research Grant and a gold medal at the Chelsea Flower Show.