Inventing Kaera: Architect and material scientist Kody Kato on building in harmony with nature

Growing up in Hana, a scenic town on Maui's verdant eastern end, Kody Kato was surrounded by little in the way of buildings.

The laidback Hawaiian island’s windward coast is dense with tropical rainforests, waterfalls, pools, bamboo groves, underground lava tubes, and black sand beaches.

Mesmerising for its terrain and seascapes alike, it was a place where manmade structures were few and far between, dwarfed by the natural world around them.

For an architect and material scientist in the making, this turned out to be a fitting environment to grow up in.

Kato is the inventor of Kaera — a carbon-negative alternative building material made from nature-based waste streams and by-products — which he is now introducing in Singapore after 15 years of research, development and real-world application.

The roots of that work trace back to his childhood in Hana, and to his family, as Kato tells EdgeProp Singapore in an interview.

His father was a construction contractor; his mother an intensive care unit worker with a deep love of science, biology and nature.

"I came from a family that tinkered quite a lot, always inventing things and trying new things," he says.

With construction, biology and the wilderness as constants in his upbringing, in a town that was "just complete nature", pursuing sustainable architecture felt like an obvious next step, Kato shares.

Charting an unconventional path

In university, in the early 2000s, he requested to major in architecture alongside structural engineering and biology at the same time, but was told it was impossible as those fields were too distinct.

Refusing to accept that, he crafted a custom course syllabus of his own and presented it to the faculty in architecture school.

"I'm a bit stubborn and didn't want to give up," Kato quips. "At 19 years old, I was trying to change the university system."

They eventually agreed to tailor his programme to include the different disciplines. He would spend the next decade working across them, culminating in a PhD with a focus on performance-oriented design, structural engineering, and mathematical biology.

That formed the foundation of what he now calls Creative Engineering — a unique design methodology combining architecture, engineering, material science, biology, and environmental performance into a single continuous process.

Creative Engineering at work

Under the proprietary framework, pioneered by Kato in the early 2000s, material development is inseparable from architectural thinking.

The multidisciplinary approach has given rise to his most innovative work to date: Kaera, which is designed as an active carbon-negative, bio-material system that sequesters carbon throughout its lifecycle while meeting the structural demands of construction.

"With Creative Engineering, we're trying to create 100% recycled structures and buildings that are high-performance, eco-friendly and respond to their surroundings," Kato says.

This design philosophy is also the foundation at the Office for Design Evolution (ODE), a Kuala Lumpur-based architectural firm he founded that explores how architecture can be conceived at the level of raw materials instead of applied finishes.

With a lean team of about six, ODE's practice draws on computational studies, sustainable processes, as well as recycled, natural and alternative materials.

The firm designs low- to zero-carbon solutions for international projects that have included residences, offices, skyscrapers, museums, symphony halls, factories, exhibition spaces, and bridges.

Innovation through practice

In 2010, Kato and two other students entered an international competition for architectural design with a project named Liberated Memories, which received the Best Prize.

The proposal was for a structure that comprised columns and slabs made with indigenous materials such as recycled earth, bamboo and ash, at an abandoned building from 1906 in rural Hawaii.

Unfortunately, the vision for the earth columns could not realistically be brought to life then.

"When we tried to build the project, there was no such thing as Kaera or structural earth columns and walls at the time," Kato says. "The moment I realised we couldn't build it … was pretty major."

It led him to start what would become the painstaking 15-year journey to create Kaera, by investigating material behaviour, ageing and environmental interaction.

The first decade went into research and development. Kato's experience working with alternative materials and hand-casting at BCHO, the office of Byoung Soo Cho — an acclaimed South Korean architect known for his understated, nature-oriented designs — laid the foundation for Kaera's development shortly after.

At the firm, Kato and the BCHO team could experiment with a wide variety of materials, which included combining earth with different binders. "I was free to explore," he says.

"Getting to cast and make things with my hands at full scale [in real architectural contexts] was another stepping stone towards being able to create new materials," Kato adds. "If I had just been stuck in a lab, it would have taken a very long time."

Such a hands-on, practice-led process was key to Kaera’s development.

'Icing on the cake'

After Seoul, he headed to Kuala Lumpur, where he later set up ODE in 2017 and continued to research, engineer, test, and use Kaera in actual projects.

It was around 2019 when tests indicated the material was also able to remove more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere than it emits, creating a net-beneficial environmental impact.

This carbon-negative finding let Kato heave a sigh of relief. "I could relax for a little bit. But the carbon-negative aspect was not something I was originally after, so when it happened it was icing on the cake."

Kato's main aim had been to change the way that traditional building materials are sourced, handled and processed. "Just by doing that, we’re able to create a product that has low-carbon emissions," he says.

On top of its climate credentials, Kaera also offers thermal insulation, design flexibility due to its free-form capabilities, soundproofing, fire resistance as it is non-combustible, and a compressive strength of about 25 megapascals and higher — comparable to concrete and making it robust enough for structural, load-bearing use.

Making Kaera easy to use

After 10 years of researching and developing the product, Kato spent the next three years from 2020 on making the new material cost-competitive and user-friendly, with plenty of trial and error.

"We were working with contractors on the ground to make it very easy to use, and that took years to fix. There's now very little friction and pushback," he says.

Contractors can simply mix a powder and liquid which will solidify and harden in as little as two minutes. The curing duration depends on the scale of the application or pour.

The material can also be cast into any shape or even applied by hand as a skim coat — a thin finishing layer — on walls and surfaces. Lighter than concrete by 30% to 40%, it is easier and costs less to transport and handle onsite as well.

In contrast, early versions of Kaera were unwieldy and more of a precast system. It was heavy, bulky, far more difficult to use, and would have required significant manpower to install onsite.

First adopters in residential projects

Kaera was first supplied exclusively to selected ODE clients from 2023, with a broader soft launch and scalability following in 2025.

The projects to date have been primarily private residential properties, especially bungalows, in Malaysia — where many of the pilots for the product had earlier been conducted.

Little convincing was needed, as the early clients had requested the innovative material for their homes. Many of them wanted to be "first movers and pioneers", says Kato.

"I don’t really believe in hard-selling, and don't like to force things onto people. The market has to be ready for and want such a material first," he adds.

The contractors on those projects were also "shocked" by how quickly Kaera could set and how strong it was, Kato shares.

Clients have responded well to Kaera's look and feel — a natural, organic tone that he describes as off-white and similar to raw earth. While it can be painted, most clients choose to leave it as is.

Kaera can be used for interiors such as walls, as well as for exterior panelling and landscape elements such as external paving, sidewalks and curbs.

In the longer term, Kato's goal is for Kaera to be adopted more widely as a load-bearing structural material.

Plane House: A carbon-negative family home

An early adopter of the product is the Plane House, a bungalow sitting on a mountain slope in Selangor, Malaysia. Kaera made up 79% of the materials used in the project, while concrete accounted for 15%.

The entire building, including its concrete and glass, is carbon-negative.

"We were able to achieve that by working with the engineering consultants and the client from the very beginning, to optimise and reduce the use of concrete while increasing the amount of Kaera," Kato says.

Notably, the house has a "very optimised structure" — with no beams and just a few columns — which was also made possible by the ODE team’s collaboration with the consultants and client, he adds.

ODE applied the Creative Engineering method and analysed environmental data such as wind flow and solar exposure at the earliest design stages.

The result is a project with a total embodied carbon of -3,600kg in carbon dioxide equivalents (CO2e). Embodied carbon refers to emissions from the entire life cycle of building materials, including extraction, manufacturing, transportation, and construction.

“That means, if you add up all the embodied carbon being released from the production of glass, concrete slabs, et cetera, then subtract the amount that Kaera is sequestering, you get a negative embodied-carbon factor overall [on a cradle-to-gate basis],” Kato explains.

The Plane House also cools naturally and relies less on mechanical systems. The dining area does not require air-conditioning, for example.

Expanding internationally

Outside of Malaysia, Kaera is now being introduced across the Asia Pacific region and Europe. Markets in focus include Singapore, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Australia, and parts of Europe.

"We are interested in markets that are advanced in carbon reduction efforts," says Kato.

He and his team are speaking with real estate developers, hoteliers, manufacturers, distributors and other partners spanning the residential, hospitality and commercial property sectors.

In particular, they are in discussions with a party for full distribution rights in Singapore.

"We're looking at about 10 to 12 upcoming projects across Asia Pacific," Kato says.

On the certification front, 25-year regional patents for Kaera are currently pending.

Independent testing and verification has been conducted by a range of accredited laboratories and specialist organisations in Malaysia and Singapore, including Anton Paar, the National University of Singapore, and environmental engineering companies. Further testing and certification is ongoing with TÜV SÜD.

These assessments have covered carbon footprint assessment, life-cycle assessment, material durability, compression testing, and chemical composition analysis, says Kato.

They confirm a climate impact of -0.05kg of CO2e per kg of Kaera, or -87.2kg of CO2e per cubic metre of the material — a carbon-negative result aligned with the ISO 14040 international standard for life-cycle assessments.

Building a greener future

Work on the next iterations of Kaera is already underway at ODE, where research has not let up.

"We are continually exploring how Kaera can be combined with other materials, and if the current formula can be modified to get an even greater carbon sequestration percentage or have different characteristics," Kato says.

"And cost is always a consideration, so that's something we look at simultaneously."

The goal is to further improve Kaera's performance without making it harder or more expensive to use.

Kato hopes to see more buildings that are carbon-negative and "much more beneficial for the planet" in time to come.

Fifteen years into developing Kaera, he has never lost sight of why he embarked on this journey.

His upbringing in Hana, amid lush forests and rugged volcanic landscapes, instilled in him a lasting concern for the environment. That sense of purpose continues to guide him — especially when progress stalls.

"I’m quite an environmentalist… I try to focus back on what I was trying to do, which makes dealing with bottlenecks and delays a bit easier," Kato says.

"With Kaera, we are saving ecosystems and not damaging the planet. Having that as a driver behind everything really helps me push through tough times."

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What is Kaera?

Kaera is a durable earth-based, bio-composite building material made from renewable resources.

It locks carbon in multiple mineralised forms and is designed to actively sequester atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) throughout its life cycle.

An estimated 119,805kg of CO2 equivalents have been sequestered across Kaera-based projects. It has a verified footprint on a cradle-to-gate basis.

Use cases for Kaera include walls, structural elements, panels, paving, and innovative forms.

The patent-pending product is made from abundant mineral waste streams and by-products, including excavated soil from construction sites that would otherwise head to the landfill.

Its production process does not extract from natural resources, uses low-temperature processing, and follows a zero-waste manufacturing model — with the aim of minimising energy consumption and eliminating environmental damage from the outset.

Characteristics of the material include:

Carbon-negative: traps more CO2 than it emitsLoad-bearing: compressive strength of 25 megapascals and higher, similar to concreteFree-forming: can be cast into any shapeLightweight: 30–40% lighter than concreteThermal-resistant: insulates up to 40% better than regular dense concreteFire-safe: non-combustible and fire containmentTermite-resistant: prevents termite, pest and mould damageSound-proofing: dense yet porous structure enables high acoustic dampingMinimises pollution: Up to 90% reduction in on-site airborne pollutants compared to conventional construction materials

Kaera was developed through architectural and material science research at the Kuala Lumpur-based Office for Design Evolution (ODE), a sustainable architecture firm founded by Kody Kato.

It has been refined through real-world architectural projects rather than laboratory-only testing.

According to ODE, the name Kaera combines Kato's family name with references to renewal and terra, the Latin word for earth, reflecting the material's environmental focus.