Final Report: Part 1

My personal aesthetic is filled with bright colors, sunshine, nature, and greenery. I have always gravitated towards bold, contrasting colors in my personal spaces, and find that they make me feel more alive and present. I love natural light as well, and coupled with plants and nature, I find that these elements define my personal aesthetic well.

I had an east facing room when growing up, and waking up to the sunlight streaming into my room was magical. Over time, I added suncatchers that splashed rainbows across my walls, filled every possible surface with plants, and featured bright colors like yellow, orange, and pink whenever possible. This aesthetic, whatever it is called, makes me feel at home. 

I have always loved nature, specifically animals, and even more specifically reptiles. I finally got my first reptile during the pandemic, a leopard gecko, which turned into an expansive hobby and passion. I now have around 15 reptiles in my “mini-zoo,” and teaching people about them has become one of my favorite things. I love getting to help dismantle the stigma around reptiles, and educate people about them. My personal aesthetic was heavily influenced by my love of nature and reptiles, and I would say that some natural element is prominently featured in my personal aesthetic.

My vision for this project drew upon my aesthetic, and emphasizes my love for nature and wildlife. I have kept reptiles for many years, and my favorite part about keeping them has been designing and creating their terrariums- they are truly tiny slices of nature. I created a planted terrarium with a self-sustaining ecosystem intended for two chameleon geckos (Eurydactylodes Agricolae). These terrariums, called bioactive terrariums, at their foundation consist of a substrate mix, live plants, insects such as springtails and isopods, and the inhabitant of the terrarium. The insects, colloquially known as the CUC (“clean-up crew”), eat dead leaves and most notably the inhabitant’s waste to “clean” the enclosure. This creates a self sustaining environment that needs little to no cleaning. 

I focused on these specifications to develop the function and form of this project: functionality, enrichment, visual appeal, successful growth, and a natural appearance.  

1. Functionality: My goal was to have the terrarium to fulfill the needs of my animals, first and foremost. They are very small geckos, about 3” maximum in length, and they love to perch along long thin branches. They also prefer a few different “zones” of exposure to their UVB light, which functions as an artificial sun to promote vitamin D production. To do this, I made the top area of the enclosure more “open” and bare, with lots of horizontal branches. As it continues to grow, the further down the geckos travel in the enclosure the more coverage they will have.
2. Enrichment: This goes hand-in-hand with functionality, and by creating a dynamic and ever changing environment the geckos will have plenty of stimulation and opportunities to utilize their instinctive behaviors.
3. Visual appeal: I would like this enclosure to be visually appealing, which means well balanced in terms of the plants and with a large variety of plants.
4. Successful growth: The plants grew over time, but sometimes certain plants don’t take to their new environment well and die off. I wanted all the plants to successfully grow in and fill up the enclosure, so I did extensive research to make sure I am using plants that all have similar needs.
5. Looking “natural:” I wanted this enclosure to look as natural as possible and mimic the geckos’ natural environment in New Caledonia. I tried to mimic the appearance of their natural environment to do so.

Initial inspiration pictures:

(First two images are mine, second is from Peter coxhead – Own work, CC0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=18672965)

Initial Sketch: