French designer Mathieu Lehanneur has developed a new concept for filtering air. Designed in collaboration with Harvard professor David Edwards, the Andrea air filter draws on the natural absorptive and metabolic properties of living plants.

Andrea is a living air filter which uses indoor plants to absorb the air’s toxic compounds.

Andrea is an award-winning design that is capable of absorbing toxic gases, such as formaldehyde, from home and office environments. The design is the first of its kind to use the natural purifying properties of living plants. Any household plant can be placed inside the dome, air is drawn in with a whisper-quiet fan to propel it through the leaves and root system of the plant, then out through water and soil filtration and back into the room environment.

Based on experiments performed by RTP Labs, Andrea improves the efficiency of formaldehyde removal from the air relative to plants alone by 360%. The device is particularly effective in high-use areas where air can stagnate, and harmful gases gather, such as bedrooms, home offices, kitchens & dining, family and living rooms.

For more information visit www.andreaair.com

About the designer: Mathieu Lehanneur graduated from l’ENSCI-Les Ateliers in 2001; the same year in which he founded his own studio. His early work focused on the design of medical objects aimed to improve patient compliance to medications.  In 2004, Mathieu began to serve as director of Design and research of the ESADE / Cit© du Design St Etienne. In 2006, he received the Carte Blanche of VIA and the Grand Prix de la Cr©ation of the City of Paris. Lehanneur’s designs appear in the permanent collections of FRAC Ile-de-France, MoMA New York City and MoMA San Francisco.

About the designer: David Edwards is a scientist and writer and founder of Le Laboratoire. He also retains a faculty position at Harvard University, where he teaches idea development in the arts and sciences. The inventor of new ways for treating diseases by aerosols, David is the scientific founder of the for-profit company Pulmatrix and the international nonprofit Medicine in Need (MEND).  At Le Laboratoire he invented and launched commercially Le Whif, the first product in the new field of aerosol cuisine, which he is exploring with French chef Thierry Marx. David Edwards is a member of the American National Academy of Engineering since 2001.