For more than two centuries, cement production meant combustion: burning limestone in kilns that reach well over 1000°C, burning fossil fuels to maintain those temperatures, and releasing huge amounts of carbon dioxide as an unavoidable chemical byproduct. Traditional cement production accounts for about 8% of global CO2 emissions and concrete is the second most consumed material on Earth, after water.
In this setting, Mimica tile growing in a mold at room temperature through the natural processes of bacteria sounds equally absurd. However, it could change what we imagine architectural materials to be. Biomasonthe North Carolina company that developed Mimmik’s underlying technology learned how nature grows one of its most robust and resilient species: coral.
Mimmik tiles © Biomason
Research process © Biomason
Pepper Mimmik tiles © Biomason
Ginger Mimmik tiles © Biomason
Production process © Biomason
Pepper Mimmik tile © Biomason
Office floors in the Netherlands © FRONT Materials
Mimmik tiles © Biomason
The principle at work is biomimicry in its literal form: not imitating the shape of a natural structure, but replicating its natural process. The bacterial spores in the biomortar are activated and then precipitate carbon and calcium to create calcium carbonate, the same chemical composition found in limestone or marble, without the need for kilns.
The company was founded in 2012 by architect Ginger Krieg Dosier, who in 2005 asked herself:what if we could grow cement?Years and many experiments later, Dosier managed to answer her question positively, transforming their production from a small laboratory to a company with more than 100 employees.
What distinguishes Mimmik tile from previous generations of low-carbon materials is the undeniable logic of its underlying chemistry. Traditional Portland cement is a hydrated calcium silicate material whose production requires the release of carbon from limestone through intense heating, emitting carbon dioxide as a byproduct. Biocement reverses this process, combining carbon and calcium to produce a biologically formed limestone material, meaning high heat and fossil fuels are not required and the carbon is used as a building block rather than being discarded.
The final material consists of approximately 85% granite from recycled sources as aggregate, bonded together with 15% organically grown limestone. After being released from the mold, the tiles are cured for about 40 hours at ambient temperature. The technology is now in its third generation and is claimed to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by at least 60% compared to conventional cement production.
The tiles are marketed through FRONT Materials and come in four variants: Ginger and Pepper colors, which can be chosen in honed or polished finishes. Notable completed projects include a zero-emission office at Tower Bridge Court in London, the world’s largest biocement installation to date at the Helix Lab in Kalundborg, Denmark, and sustainable office flooring in the Netherlands.
Staying away from specifics, of Biomason’s The Mimmik tile is interesting not only as a product but as a demonstration of what becomes possible when the intellectual frameworks of biology and architecture converge around a genuine industrial problem. Nature will always be the world’s greatest designerand it will always be a good idea to learn from its principles and try to apply them to our man-made and anthropocentric problems, realizing that perhaps the solution has been there all along.
