Our built world is largely anthropocentric, centered around and on human needs and desires. One just has to look up at bird nests on telephone polls, or at plants sprouting in between the cracks of a sidewalk to remember that we live alongside other species and that our built spaces impact more than just humans. Architecture and design largely operate in a vacuum as if detached from ecosystems and geology. Highways break up animal migration routes, mining of heavy metals for phones contaminates the surrounding water and kills off fish, logging for wood products has stripped homes away from countless creatures.

The dangerous disregard for other life forms has made habitat destruction, extinction, displacement, and pollution a standard cost of doing business. By reorganizing the way our designs interact with other species there is an opportunity to create multispecies spaces that allow for thriving eco-centric design.

 In this Olio, designers and non designers are invited to explore the rich links and connections we have to flora and fauna and reimagine how we co-inhabit spaces. By looking at an overview of designs that inadvertently serve animals, ones that aim to restrict them, and ones that are designed to support them - we will start to see the blurred lines of our spaces and to celebrate interspecies connection. Each participant will be asked to imagine a design based on briefs that center other creatures. Animal as client.