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News · March 23, 2026
A World Water Day reflection from OKRA Academy
Water shapes our landscapes, cities, and daily lives. As pressures on water systems grow, concerns about water quality are becoming increasingly urgent and complex. With water at the core of our work, we are expanding our focus beyond flood mitigation and water storage to also address water quality, making it a central area of exploration in our practice and research.
By bringing together designers, researchers, and specialists, the OKRA Academy investigates how nature-based systems and green-blue infrastructures can help preserve and improve water quality. By combining design thinking with ecological and technical knowledge, we aim to better understand how living with water can be meaningfully integrated into the landscape, supporting healthier water cycles and, in turn, more resilient environments.
Transforming water quality into a design opportunity
Due to urbanization and (agro‑)industrialisation, water bodies—particularly in the Netherlands—already contain increasing levels of pollutants that affect ecosystems, biodiversity, and the quality of life. With climate extremes intensifying, these pressures are already putting water systems at risk and will become critical if not addressed now.
We treat water quality as an integral part of design, not a technical afterthought. By understanding how water systems and pollutants move through urban and rural environments, which natural treatment processes can address those pollutants, and how these processes can be integrated within nature‑based design solutions, we create landscapes that actively support cleaner, healthier, and more resilient water systems. These actionable design solutions translated from complex scientific mechanisms can be applied across projects, from neighbourhood parks to regional landscapes.
“As water systems come under pressure from urbanisation, climate change, and declining water quality, we use landscape-based design and green-blue structures to make every drop count, creating green, healthy and climate proof cities that add lasting spatial and social value.”
— Janneke van Bergen, Senior project leader | Regional and water design specialist, OKRA
Sustaining and improving the water cycle
- Preserve existing water cycles and ecological conditions
- Regenerate water quality through green‑blue infrastructures, from urban infiltration zones to planted shores
- Design with intention, creating places where water quality is integral to the design process and crucial to the successful outcome
This ambition guides our practice from concept to execution, ensuring that water quality becomes an inherent and functional layer in the landscapes and public spaces we create.
Research-based integration for real-world challenges
Connected raingarden test beds filter polluted road runoff as part of a nature-based drainage system
Buffer zones protect nutrient-low seepage waters from nutrient-rich agricultural flows through spatial compartmentalisation
Towards clearer waters
The water systems we design with are complex yet full of potential. Green‑blue infrastructure has a large potential to add water quality to any waterbody. For each recurring water challenge, our research on nature-based systems offers new ways forward.
Every park can support a healthier water cycle. And every design decision, from soil composition to planting palettes, can make a difference.
Living with water
We design landscapes that establish and improve a healthy, natural relationship with water. Whether they are applied on the coast, in the city or in rural areas, our solutions are nature-based, science-backed, sustainable and resilient. This results in naturally integrated environments for people and nature.
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