Towards an Interspecies Architecture
Robin Sparkes November 4, 2025
Bird’s songs are swallowed by human cacophony. The low hum of industrial noise, the pulse of traffic, the ongoing percussion of construction, drown out their call. Noise pollution erodes communication across the living networks, our resonant ecology. Birds, like so many species, are disrupted by the presence of humans in the places we build and live.
As architects and as humans, it is our responsibility to design for multispecies resilience in acts of attunement. It requires a sensitivity, a listening to the subtle soundscape of cohabitation. From the materiality and form of space - its orientation, its ecological companions - to trees and shrubs, wind and sun. Design, in this sense, becomes an instrument capable of amplifying or softening the audible world. Our task is to compose spaces that listen as much as they speak, acknowledging the lives of our neighbours as part of the living score.
To design for birds is to think like a bird. What works, they learn, what they learn, they remember, and what they remember, they refine, and adapt. "Cognition in birds is subject to a positive feedback loop involving niche breadth. Greater cognitive potentials permit more elaborate nests, which can enable species to enjoy broader niches" (Gould 2007). In this way, birds are architects of their own worlds, shaping and reshaping their environments in response to sound, space, and shelter. Therefore, when we observe the bird, we can begin to understand what needs are specific to their environment.
Just as it does for the bird, every element participates in shaping our domestic space. This is a matter of materials; vegetation shapes space and dampens intrusive noise. We can create acoustic shadows, subtly linking structure to substructure and the life around it. Porous, absorptive or diffusive surfaces help dissipate low-frequency noise, reducing reverberation. Precise orientation, elevation and spatial arrangement can preserve communication exchange.
How can we begin to imagine interventions in our design choices that sustain life in an anthropocentric world? Birdhouses and nesting niches can be incorporated into the surfaces, ornamentation and rhythm of a building, where we provide space to live alongside other species.
When we design with research-led intentions, paying close attention to how birds think, we engage in what Donna Haraway describes as "tentacular thinking”. Haraway uses the metaphor of tentacles to suggest that life is threaded, interconnected, and networked. Instead of thinking of individual beings as isolated points or bounded spheres, she urges us to see them connected by many lines, paths of relationship, influence, response, and affect. When we listen to the birds, we begin to hear our own environment anew. We can apply through the act of research and design, both the lives we neighbour and the spaces we ourselves inhabit.
“Designing with birds teaches us to listen differently”
History offers both architectural precedents and spiritual connection to living with birds. From the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries, during the Ottoman empire, architects integrated birdhouses, known as kuş köşkü, serçe saray, or güvercinlik, into the walls of mosques, madrasas, fountains, mausolea, and other public and religious buildings. These miniature palaces were often ornately detailed, harmonizing with the aesthetic of the host structure. They were placed high to receive sunlight, oriented away from human made noise, and sheltered from predators. This careful integration reflects a cultural ethic of respect for birds and an understanding of their role in urban biodiversity. Many of these birdhouses still survive on the façades of Istanbul’s historical architecture.
Antoni Gaudí’s Park Güell (1900–1914) offers a modern parallel in Barcelona. Terraced walls and walkways incorporate built-in bird nests, while abundant vegetation and stonework create habitat niches, perches, and feeding grounds. The sheltered cavities reduce mortality from cold and rain and, acoustically, offer places where quieter calls have space to be heard. The park supports many bird species, for both resident and migratory birds. It uses organic geometries, local materials, and the subtle integration of built and natural elements to merge urban environment and nature. In this way, architecture, material choices, spatial arrangement, and flora converge to create spaces where birds thrive.
Both precedents demonstrate that designing for birds can be an act of cohabitation. Ottoman birdhouses and Gaudí’s integrated nests show that ornament and function can coexist. Vegetation continues to play a critical role by absorbing noise, partitioning space, and creating acoustic shadows. Elevation, orientation, and exposure to sunlight and wind enhance the transmission of high-frequency calls while also preserving cultural and spiritual practices in connecting us to nature.
Designing with birds teaches us to listen differently and to carefully observe the interplay of sound, space, and life. Through attentive research and considered intervention, we can learn about the birds and also about the sites we inhabit, the environments we shape, and the connections between human and nonhuman life. Here we can discover new ways of inhabiting the world ourselves. Architecture, therefore, can become a bridge across species, a reminder that responsible design is an act of listening, learning, and responding.
Robin Sparkes, is a spatial designer, studying the kinesthetic experience of architecture. Her design, research, and writing practice traverses the relationship between the body, temporality, and the acoustics of space.
