Nido de Todos

Interaction Design, 2018

78 bird species share the Universidad de los Andes campus, and almost no one in the community knew it. The brief was to make that invisible biodiversity visible, in a cold, lifeless plaza between academic buildings, through an interactive installation people would actually stop for.

We cross-referenced the university's own illustrated bird guide with foot-traffic data from campus turnstiles, then translated real bird behavior into the installation's mechanics. PVC-and-wicker panels formed nest-like structures holding Arduino-driven acrylic fans, one per species, color-coded to match its plumage and mounted at the height it typically nests. As campus foot traffic rose, the fans closed like birds retreating from a crowd, and as it dropped, they opened again, lit at night to stay visible after hours.

As a student project, formal visitor metrics weren't collected. What the installation delivered was concrete, translating all 78 documented campus bird species into a physical, data-driven structure that people could walk through and directly cause to react, turning an abstract sustainability message into something legible and real.