Designing with Nature: Can Service Design Make Greener Cities Work Better?
By Francisca Tapia, PhD – 10.03.26
Cities around the world are facing serious challenges like flooding, extreme heat, air pollution, and loss of nature. Nature-Based Solutions (NbS) , using natural systems like green roofs, rain gardens, and urban forests, offer powerful ways to tackle these problems. But here’s the key: these green solutions only work in the long run if the people who use them and care for them are involved from the very beginning. Success depends on making sure everyone, from city staff to residents to local businesses, understands how these natural systems benefit them and feels responsible for keeping them healthy over time. That’s where thoughtful participatory processes come in: they help create green infrastructure that people actually want to maintain because they were engaged in its development and recognise its value in their daily lives.
Cover image: Bio-Solar roof in Bolzano. Source: Tapia & Reith, 2025 Adapted from Just Nature Project ID: 10100375
FRANCISCA TAPIA – PhD & Research Consultant
Francisca Tapia is a senior research consultant at ABUD, specialising in building engineering and Nature-Based Solutions (NbS) assessment. Her work focuses on climate strategies and participatory approaches that bridge technical expertise with community needs. Her PhD explored how service design methodologies can transform NbS implementation in cities, emphasising early-stage co-design, stakeholder engagement, and integrating diverse perspectives to address complex urban challenges.
From my hands-on experience working with cities, I’ve seen that service design tools create lasting NbS designs where technical approaches often fail. While technical tools like environmental impact assessments focus on ecological measurements, they often miss the human element.
The literature supports this too—as Stickdorn et al. (2018) note in This is Service Design Doing, these tools provide practical frameworks for visualizing complex relationships, spotting potential problems before they arise, and developing solutions that genuinely work for everyone involved.
I tested whether a small set of accessible service design tools—redesigned and adapted for NbS purposes—could make NbS implementation clearer, fairer, and more durable.
Why Service Design Meets NbS
Service design is an approach that emphasizes human-centeredness, collaboration, sequencing, and holistic thinking. In the context of NbS implementation, service design offers a human-centered approach that complements the ecological emphasis of NbS.
The literature supports this too—as Stickdorn et al. (2018) note in This is Service Design Doing, these tools provide practical frameworks for visualizing complex relationships, spotting potential problems before they arise, and developing solutions that genuinely work for everyone involved.
Rather than focusing solely on environmental performance, service design tools reveal motivations, expectations, operational gaps, and collaborative opportunities that remain invisible in traditional technical processes. This research tested whether service design tools—such as motivation matrices and stakeholder maps—could transform NbS implementation in urban environments.
Urban greening projects are often promoted as climate solutions, but they also require collaboration, coordination, and care—elements that don’t always emerge naturally in bureaucratic systems. Beyond physical design, this study addressed three critical questions:
- What barriers prevent NbS from working long-term?
- Can service design tools help overcome these barriers?
- What could truly inclusive green infrastructure look like when all stakeholders participate in the design process?
Understanding the Challenge and Testing SD
Throughout this research journey, I explored the implementation challenges of Nature-based Solutions by diving deep into an analysis of EU NbS projects within the Horizon 2020 framework. To make sense of the complex collaboration dynamics at play, I employed several service design tools that proved invaluable for understanding stakeholder relationships and workflows. These tools were redesigned and adapted for the NbS context and terminology. For instance, Stakeholder Mapping (1) helped me visualise the intricate web of actors involved , from community members and policymakers to NGOs and academic institutions , revealing both formal and informal networks that shape NbS success. I also relied on the Motivation Matrix (2), which allowed me to map out the entire implementation process, distinguishing between what stakeholders experience directly and the behind-the-scenes activities that support those experiences. These tools became valuable methods for identifying where collaboration succeeded and where obstacles emerged, shaping the approach I propose in this research across two cities with different NbS.
(1) Motivation matrix: A tool used to map and compare users’ motivations against their behaviors, highlighting discrepancies and opportunities for targeted interventions.
(2) Stalkeholder Mapping: A visual representation of all individuals and organizations involved in a system, showing relationships, influence, and communication flows.
Two Cities, One Question: What Makes NbS Work Long-Term?
In Bolzano, I worked with local authorities, researchers, and private-sector partners to co-design a bio-solar rooftop combining vegetation with photovoltaic panels. The service design tools helped the group move beyond mere energy performance and imagine the roof as a living laboratory.
Together, participants envisioned:
- Raised beds with herbs and edible plants
- Shaded learning spaces for school and university groups
- Monitoring activities connecting biodiversity, microclimate, and solar performance
Through co-design, we uncovered critical issues that technical documents had overlooked—such as gaps in irrigation knowledge among maintenance staff and unclear decision-making protocols for plant replacement. Visualising actor networks and operational flows made otherwise hidden responsibilities immediately clear.
The process transformed a technical installation into a multifunctional educational ecosystem and exposed the operational structures needed to support it.
Szombathely, Hungary: The Living Schoolyard
In Szombathely, the challenge was to reimagine a grey schoolyard into a nature-based learning environment. Co-creation sessions brought together teachers, parents, municipal staff, and maintenance workers.
Stakeholder journey mapping revealed:
- Teachers prioritised educational value
- Maintenance staff emphasised practicality
- Parents focused on safety and social cohesion
These insights led the group away from conventional playground equipment and toward a food-growing garden with native species, integrating learning, community involvement, and environmental restoration. The crucial achievement was building maintenance and operational responsibilities into the design process itself. Care tasks were distributed among students, teachers, and parents, generating a sense of ownership and ensuring long-term stewardship. Here, NbS became not just physical changes, but social infrastructure that nurtured participation, learning, and shared responsibility.
What was found
- Barrier overload: Current NbS planning overwhelms stakeholders with complex technical tools. In Bolzano, dense hydrological data left many confused and disengaged. Simpler visual tools dramatically increased participation.
- Design tools made a difference: Service design approaches made participation more meaningful and results more durable. Color-coded motivation maps in Szombathely helped community members quickly identify shared interests. These tools bridged knowledge gaps between diverse actors, creating practical solutions backed by scientific expertise.
- Context matters: The same approach in two cities yielded different insights, highlighting how NbS must be tailored to local ecological conditions and community needs.
Key Takeaways
- Start with people, not just plants. Ecological success requires social engagement and operational clarity.
- Use accessible tools. They demystify ecological concepts and foster shared understanding.
- Co-design early and often. Bringing diverse actors together from the start reveals hidden needs and barriers.
- Embed maintenance into design. Without care structures, NbS cannot survive long term.
- Value ecosystem services. A project is not an NbS unless it delivers genuine ecological function.
Do you want to know more?
Three peer-reviewed articles emerged from this research, offering detailed insights into the proposed framework and case studies:
- “From Design to Action: Service design tools for enhancing collaboration in NbS implementation”
Published in Environmental Management
👉 Read it here - “Integrating Service Design Principles in NbS Implementation: Insights from Szombathely (Hungary)”
Published in City and Environment Interactions
👉 Read it here - “Service design for nature-based solutions: The Bolzano green roof case study
Published in Nature Based Solutions
👉 Read it here
This research was conducted as part of my doctoral studies under the supervision of Dr. András Reith, in collaboration with ABUD – ADVANCED BUILDING & URBAN DESIGN, a consortium member in the JustNature project, funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation programme.
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