AskNature Learning

The Nature of Innovation is a cohort-based course designed for scientists, engineers, designers, biomimicry enthusiasts, and impact-driven entrepreneurs eager to transform their nature-inspired ideas into real-world solutions. Co-created by AskNature Learning and the Ray of Hope Accelerator, this program offers practical tools, startup case studies, and expert guidance to help participants navigate the journey from research or concept to market. It’s tailored for those with existing ideas or research insights, focusing on applying biomimicry principles, business modeling, and impact measurement—without covering ideation or academic theory.

Throughout the course, participants will explore how to align their innovations with nature’s design principles, develop viable business models, and understand pathways for funding, IP, and partnerships. You’ll learn storytelling techniques, build supportive networks, and gain access to the Ray of Hope ecosystem—providing an unmatched insight into what works in nature-inspired ventures. Whether transitioning from academia or advancing prototypes, this course empowers changemakers to turn their passion for nature-inspired innovation into impactful, market-ready solutions.

Unlike the Ray of Hope Accelerator, this 4-week course is open to anyone with a nature-inspired idea and does not require an application or a fully formed startup.

• Early-stage nature-inspired entrepreneurs. Particularly those still in or transitioning from academia (PhDs, post-docs) into nature-inspired and impact-driven ventures.
• Scientists, engineers and designers with strong technical ideas looking to understand commercialization and market pathways.
• Biomimicry enthusiasts who have a well-developed idea or prototype but lack business know-how (and sometimes, scientific backing).
• Sustainability professionals seeking to turn nature-inspired ideas into products or ventures with measurable impact.
• Potential applicants of the Ray of Hope Accelerator (or even applicants that were turned away because they were too early or not a good fit for the program).

• Participants will learn how to align nature’s design principles to develop nature-inspired ideas into viable, market-ready solutions.
• Participants will understand business modeling, funding pathways, IP, and partnerships to support innovation growth.
• Participants will gain skills in storytelling and communication to effectively engage stakeholders and investors.
• Participants will build networks within the Ray of Hope ecosystem and learn from real-world case studies of successful nature-inspired ventures.

Module 1: From inspiration to innovation: laying the groundwork for a nature-inspired venture

Module 2: From lab bench to business model: commercial pathways for biomimicry

Module 3: Impact-driven entrepreneurship: leading with purpose and practicality

Module 4: Building bridges: storytelling, funding, and the power of community

Few industries command such global influence while intertwining as deeply with our daily lives as the fashion and textile industry, yet its rapid growth has exacted a heavy toll on our planet. The waste generated has further created a fundamentally broken system that is a significant contributor to humanity’s overshoot of Earth’s ecological limits and planetary boundaries. The industry operates on a linear “take-make-waste” model that depletes finite resources, generates enormous amounts of non-degradable waste and pollution, and operates with disregard for natural ecological cycles. Urgent action is needed to transform how we design and operate the fashion sector, recognizing that everything we make will ultimately return to the Earth. By learning from nature’s time-tested strategies, particularly the processes of decomposition through breakdown and transformation of materials, we can shift the industry towards a regenerative system.

This course will dive deeper into the current paradigm, and equip participants with the tools and inspiration needed to look to nature for solutions. Each week, we will host discussions and activities aimed at addressing the underlying challenges within this system as well as hear from companies leading the way in creating a life-friendly future. The Nature of Materials: Textiles course is a unique opportunity to immerse yourself in a community of biomimicry-minded sector-professionals and understand how to better translate strategies from the natural world to areas where they might make a real impact in the fashion and textile industry.

• Anyone in the fashion and textile industry ready to make a change
• Environmentalists and sustainability professionals 
• Designers, industry professionals, manufacturers, creators, company representatives, and other activators 
• Young professionals/university students
• No prior experience in biomimicry required, just your curiosity for nature’s inspiration

• Participants will develop a greater understanding of what it means to transform waste into a resource as inspired by nature and drive a related sector of the fashion industry to be more nature positive. 
• Participants will learn how to turn to nature for design solutions, and connect deeply with the organisms and strategies that they are inspired by.
• Participants will recognize the big ideas in this industry that can further help foster solutions towards the polycrisis of climate change and biodiversity loss.

Module 1: Understanding the Fashion Landscape 

Module 2: Learning from Nature – Introduction to the Biomimicry Process in Fashion and Textiles 

Module 3: The Solution Space Ecosystem

Module 4: Systems Shift