Moss Buds

Overview

Moss Buds is a speculative design project situated at the intersection of sensory accessibility, more-than-human design, and disability studies.

Through fabulations, the project challenges dominant models of assistive and noise-canceling technology and proposes an ecological and care-centered approach rooted in sensory justice, material empathy, and more-than-human companionship.

We imagined a future where noise pollution has made human ears fragile. In this world, people wear soft moss-based interfaces—Moss Buds—that filter, shape, and curate sound based on sensory, emotional, and ecological needs.

It moves beyond conventional noise-cancellation and sensory regulation technologies and reimagines sound curation as a relational, ecological, and care-based practice informed by disability and neurodivergent ways of knowing.

Project Details

My Role: Experience/UI Designer • Technical Artist • Worldbuilder • Material Researcher • Moss Buds Fabricator
Technologies: Figma · Procreate · Wire Craft · Speculative Design · Disability Studies · Material Exploration
Team: Daksh Kapoor · Savannah Mosley · Audrey Chung
Timeline: March-May 2025

The Problem

Noise pollution is an often invisible—but pervasive—hazard that affects not only hearing, but also sensory regulation, emotional wellbeing, and ecological health. Urban soundscapes can be hostile, especially for people with sensory sensitivities such as autism and sensory processing disorders. Yet noise pollution is rarely addressed with the same urgency as other environmental threats, despite its impact on both humans and more-than-human environments, including wildlife and ecosystems. As Aznim Ruhana Md Yusup (2019) writes,

“Noise pollution is making us deaf and killing us slowly.”

Already, 1 in 6 teenagers shows hearing loss linked to everyday noise exposure (CDC, 2020).

Current noise-canceling technologies focus on blocking or isolating sound, framing sensory difference as an individual issue to be corrected rather than a relational experience shaped by bodies, environments, and ecologies.

Instead of isolating, what if hearing could be reimagined as a practice of connection, collective care, and co-existence? How can disability and neurodivergent perspectives help us redesign hearing technologies around care, interdependence, and justice?

The Solution

Moss Buds is a biomaterial-based wearable that adapts to the wearer’s ear shape and uses living moss as an acoustic and relational interface. Through a companion app, users curate which sounds they want to keep—like voices, laughter, or birdsong—and which to soften or filter. 

As the moss responds to environmental conditions, its pattern and texture visually shift, making hearing an embodied, sensory, and emotional experience. Rather than quieting the world, Moss Buds invites people to attune to their sound ecologies.

Design Approach

We approached this project through speculative worldbuilding, cripping, and material exploration to rethink hearing technologies beyond isolation or cancellation. Instead of treating sound as something to block, we explored how listening could become a practice of curation, care, and ecological relationship.

Imagine a future where unchecked noise pollution has rendered human ears fragile. Even 40 dB (the volume of a quiet library) can cause hearing loss and ear damage. Society begins to seek advice from disability and neurodivergent communities, who have long cultivated embodied strategies for sensory care, more-than-human, and attentiveness.

Rather than designing to block sound, we asked how listening could become a practice of tuning, tending, and sensory co-existence.

From this fabulation emerged Moss Buds—biomaterial wearables inspired by moss’s acoustic filtering, softness, and symbolic associations with rest, slowness, and symbiosis. Paired with a companion app, Moss Buds helps users:

• Curate which sounds to let in (e.g., birdsong, rain, a friend’s voice)

  
  

• Set safe decibel thresholds based on sensory comfort

  
  

• Monitor “moss health” to emphasize mutual care between user, environment, and wearable

  
  

• Stay aware of changing conditions in their sonic environment

  
  

• Browse and contribute to an open-source library of shared sound curation presets.

  
  

  

As Technical Artist and UI Designer, I developed the visual identity of the interface. We intentionally moved away from sterile, medical aesthetics and instead used textures, soft greens and organic shapes to evoke softness, sensory empathy, and ecological co-existence.

To complement the digital interface, I hand-crafted physical moss wearable prototypes inspired by wire-crafting jewelry techniques and historical uses of moss for natural healing. This additional artifact highlights the framing of moss as both material and companion in our design process.

Key Outcomes

Moss Buds generated speculative design artifacts and research insights, including:

• A physical moss-based wearable

  
  

• A speculative companion app for sound curation

  
  

• A reframing of hearing from a medical issue to an ecological and relational practice

  
  

• “Sound curation” as a care-based alternative to noise cancellation

  
  

• A creative model for sensory justice, rooted in disability studies and more-than-human entanglement

  
  

• A case study showing how fabulation can inform the future of sensory technology grounded in care and interdependence 

Impact

Moss Buds helps reimagine noise pollution not just as a technical challenge, but as a matter of care, ecology, and justice. It invites designers to consider sensory experiences as relational and communal, rather than purely individual. The project models how accessible technologies can foreground empathy, softness, and co-existence to shape more caring and just futures.

Reflection and Futures

Moss Buds showed how speculative and disability-led design can shift the focus from fixing sensory differences to honoring them. Instead of isolating the body from sound, the project explores how hearing can be a practice of care, curation, and ecological relationship. It reframes sound as a material condition to be engaged with—not blocked—encouraging designers to consider sensory justice, interdependence, and more-than-human companionship in future technologies. The project opens pathways for designing systems that listen back—attuning to bodies, environments, and shared sensory worlds.

References

Hillier, David. “Loud Noises Are Slowly Ruining Your Health.” VICE. 2016. https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/ppvkwb/is-excessive-noise-messing-with-your-health.

Orwig, Jessica, David Anderson, and Nathaniel Lee. “Noise Pollution Affects Human Hearing, Health, and Quality of Life.” Business Insider, 2018.

Yusup, Aznim Ruhana Md. “In Search of Silence.” New Straits Times, 2017. https://www.nst.com.my/news/2017/03/222998/search-silence.

Eichwald, Jacqueline, and Francesca Scinicariello. “Survey of Teen Noise Exposure and Efforts to Protect Hearing at School — United States, 2020.” Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, vol. 69, 2020, pp. 1822–1826. https://doi.org/10.15585/mmwr.mm6948a5.