welcome to the multispecies lab
by centering multispecies entanglements, we consider the ongoing effects of environmental change on world-making and ways in which human-built environments can embrace ecological empathy.
thinking
We are a collective based at The New School in New York City — a gathering of like-minded humans from diverse design fields, alongside scholars and thinkers from across the university: philosophy, anthropology, sociology, architecture, product design, interior design, and other interdisciplinary practices. Our work is varied and many-voiced, converging through an ever-expanding collective attuned to imagining different ways for humans to engage the more-than-human life that not only makes human life possible but also imbues it with wonder.
The Multispecies Lab Research Collective seeks to create a space of creative refuge amidst the accelerating crisis of extinction, driven by habitat loss, toxic pollution, and climate change—unfolding against a backdrop of political apathy and negligence. At the heart of this crisis lies a fundamental disconnection: the failure to recognize that human existence is inextricably woven into the larger web of nonhuman life. In a time of ecological and social emergencies we need to shift frameworks away from more human exceptionalism, that is serving humans with individual and collective malaise. We ask what type of institutions and narratives might become imaginable if we push the boundaries of our imagination to include the Earth as breathing?
we ask: how can art, design, and scholarship reimagine human relationships with the more-than-human world? What strategies can restore reciprocity between species and challenge the extractive paradigms that have shaped our current ecological reality?
featured work
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![A potted plant with large green leaves, including some reddish-pink flowers, arranged in a tall beige pot with multiple smaller decorative pots stacked below, set against a plain white background.]()
WARM, FUZZY, TOXIC Milkweed fiber exploration
a ‘weed’ that provides a source of fiber which can be used as an alternative to carbon-heavy synthetics such as polyester, or conventionally grown cotton.
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![Wooden birdhouse sculpture shaped like stacked multicolored bamboo tubes on a tree stump in a garden with green foliage and a blue sky.]()
Multispecies Totem
a modular, compostable totem supporting urban wildlife, solar energy, and water collection raising awareness of bird migration deaths in cities.
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![A pigeon with the body of a bird and the face of a human.]()
Wings of Desire, Nikola Tesla’s fantastic secret
explore Dominic Pettman’s “Wings of Desire,” revealing Nikola Tesla’s emotional world through his extraordinary bond with a white pigeon.
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![A painting of a young man with dark hair, wearing a black jacket, a light-colored shirt, a tie, and yellow trousers, standing with hands on hips against a plain background.]()
Electric Caresses, Rilke, Balthus, and Mitsou
balthus’s early bond with his cat Mitsou shaped his artistic focus on feline imagery and complex human-animal relationships.
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![Book cover titled 'Resistencia de TPO Pensamiento' with abstract geometric shapes and Spanish text in black and red colors.]()
Ecofeminism as decolonial and transindividual ecology
this essay merges decolonial ecofeminism with transindividuality, framing the self as relational and fluid. It proposes a queer, boundary-defying ecology rooted in collective becoming.
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The Architecture of (hu)Man Exceptionalism
critiques architecture’s role in human exceptionalism and calls for rethinking built environments through ecofeminist, posthuman ethics.
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![A map showing bird species and a city skyline. The map depicts different neighborhoods in Brooklyn and Manhattan, with icons of various birds labeled and some areas highlighted. There are circular insets showing cityscapes and a graph of skyline profiles at the bottom.]()
Avian Habitat Loss + the Climate Crisis in NYC
a research on avian habitat loss + the climate crisis in NYC
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![Book cover titled "Cosmodality" edited by Gokhan Kodalak, with a geometric background pattern in shades of gray.]()
Cosmodality
cosmodality reimagines architecture as a cosmic, multispecies art beyond human-centric design and towards planetary existence.
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![Close-up of white, textured and curled paper or sheet-like materials, resembling art or craft materials.]()
Multispecies Sculptures for Urban Wildlife
layered ceramic sculptures foster urban multispecies empathy, blending digital molds and handcraft to shelter small animals.
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![A digital thermometer displaying 78.6°F and 62% humidity, surrounded by white geometric lace-like paper cutouts arranged on a flat surface.]()
Multispecies design: 3D-printed biomimetic structures
this paper explores posthuman, multispecies design through biomimetic plant structures that enhance microclimates via Thing Ethnography.
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Multispecies Care Survey
a public survey exploring multispecies care practices that challenge human supremacy and support localized, embodied plant-human relationships.
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![Art installation with a beige organic shape on a blue pedestal on the left, a cluster of orange spheres on a stand in the center, a wooden star on a small blue stand on the right, and a white cloud-like sculpture with vapor on a stand on the far right, all against a light blue background.]()
Designs for a World of Many Worlds
a fictional festival imagining multispecies coexistence through sensory artefacts and costumes that reflect nonhuman perceptions of the world.
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![Close-up of a gorilla's face with text overlay reading 'Animal Crisis' and authors Alice Crary and Lori Gruen.]()
Animal Crisis: A New Critical Theory
Crary and Gruen call for animal liberation and human emancipation through a critical, anti-human supremacist rethinking of ethics.
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![A close-up of a Daniel Wellington watch covered in water droplets underwater, with a dark blue background and some pinkish aquatic plants at the bottom.]()
Algaphon
Algaphon is a hybrid installation where algae bubbles that ring at Minnaert frequency near algal filaments are rendered audible through a hydrophone.
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![Bright yellow massive fungus growing on a tree trunk in a forest setting.]()
Becoming Non-human/ Designing Non-human
recognizing non-human lives as equal invites deeper biosphere connection. one that might now be essential for our survival.
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![A young girl in a white jacket sitting inside a glass booth, interacting with a touchscreen monitor. She is accompanied by a chimpanzee also touching the screen. The booth has green flooring.]()
synthetic primatology
an ethnographic look at how Japanese primatologists explore chimpanzee agency across lab and field environments.
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![Close-up of a cotton plant with fluffy white seed fibers and brown seeds showing, surrounded by green leaves and pink flowers in the background.]()
Monarchs, Networks and Rhizomes
genetic studies show monarch migration evolved alongside milkweed spread, linking butterfly conservation to both ecological and digital landscapes.
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![Book cover titled 'Interspecies Politics' with colored map outlines and the author's name, Rafi Youatt.]()
Interspecies politics and the global rat: Ecology, extermination, experiment
The article explores rats as interspecies political figures, revealing dynamics of coexistence, disposability, and global human-animal entanglements.
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![Illustration of a green herb plant with small pink flowers.]()
Seeds of change
Seeds of Change reveals how displaced ballast flora expose hidden colonial histories, linking plants, slavery, migration, and Alves’s “borderless history.”
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![Text from a black background with white font: 'Charles Mills's "Black Trash" Reproducing Race, Pig Waste, and Ecological Resistance'.]()
Charles Mills's 'Black Trash': Reproducing Race, Pig Waste, and Ecological Resistance
The article reinterprets Charles Mills’s “Black Trash,” linking race, ecology, and waste to highlight Black feminist ecological resistance.
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![Stack of colorful yarn skeins in red, black, white, yellow, blue, green, orange, and gray.]()
On Touching Corals
Description goes here“On Touching Coral” explores coral as a witness to colonial violence, human entanglement, and ecological rupture.
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![Pile of rocks and white electrical cords on a dirt surface near a fenced area with a salt flat or desert in the background. There is a sign that reads, 'Restricted Area, Authorized Employees Only' in English and Spanish.]()
Intensities & Intimacies of Multispecies Space-times
Microbes in the Atacama Desert thrive in extreme dryness by using fog and sunlight for energy, providing insights into life’s adaptability and potential for survival on other planets.
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![View of tree canopy with green leaves and patches of sky seen through gaps in the foliage.]()
the kinship with trees and forests: how to cultivate reciprocal relationships with trees and forests?
A cross-disciplinary roundtable exploring creative, scientific, and ethical relationships with trees and forests.
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![A person wearing a baseball cap, gray shirt, and scarf kneels outdoors among green foliage, using scientific equipment including a small net, a portable electronic device with multiple connectors, and various cables, possibly conducting field research or environmental sampling.]()
SPECULATIVE ECOACOUSTIC COMPOSITION SYSTEMS
Exploring Speculative Ecoacoustic Composition Systems
where ant, insect, and soil sounds merge into living, multispecies music.
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![Green speech bubble with message 'Vegetable Rights Now!' in colorful text.]()
THINKING LIKE A PLANT Prolegomena to a philosophy of vegetables
Reimagining cognition through the silent lives of plants, expanding what it means to think, feel, and exist beyond the human.
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