Foraging Alternative Ecosystems introduces the Eco-dispersal Device, a community-centered tool designed to rewild stressed lands by dispersing wild edible plants, pollinator flora, and more. This device is paired with a straightforward recipe, empowering individuals to "cook" their own tools for promoting biodiversity and ecological resilience. By doing so, it redefines the role of communities as active custodians of their environments.

In Lebanon, where food insecurity is compounded by wildlife depletion, the Eco-dispersal Device serves both practical and symbolic purposes. It reconnects people with the land and its regenerative potential, offering solutions deeply rooted in local ecosystems and ancestral knowledge. Lebanon has faced years of systemic collapse, characterized by economic disintegration, government neglect, and Zionist colonial aggression. Amid these challenges, food insecurity has become a pressing issue, with residents navigating disrupted infrastructures and inaccessible food systems. Yet, in the face of these hardships, foraging—an ancient practice—reemerges as a quiet act of resistance and care.

Through this project, EcoRove seeks to highlight the transformative potential of community-driven ecological practices, fostering resilience and reconnection with the land in the face of systemic challenges.

This project was shown In Beirut as Part of the Beirut Makers 2021 Exhibition, the 6th Tallinn Architecture Biennale titled “Edible; Or, The Architecture of Metabolism", and in New York City as part of the NEW INC Creative Since Dinner and as a demo workshop at STORM books & candy.

Foraging as Food Sovereignty

The eastern Mediterranean—an oasis of biodiversity—is rich in wild edible flora that has long shaped the region’s cuisine and traditions. These plants, nurtured and foraged for generations, include akkoub (gundelia), hindbeh (dandelion), khebbeyze (mallow), and rashaad (garden cress), among others. Such flora holds immense cultural significance, yet its preservation is under constant threat due to urbanization, monoculture farming, political instability, war, and cultural amnesia.

In Lebanon, foraging these wild herbs is more than a culinary or ecological act—it is an act of resistance. As access to imported food dwindles and prices soar, communities are reclaiming the abundance of their local ecosystems. Through the Eco-dispersal Device, individuals can collect seeds, archive family recipes, and disperse wild plants back into degraded territories. These small interventions rewild the land while confronting the harsh realities of food insecurity and ecological disruption.

Food, Resistance, and Memory

The reclamation of wild plants also restores community memory. In villages across Lebanon, foraging practices are accompanied by family recipes that have been passed down for generations. Dishes such as hindbeh salad, dardar with garlic, or fried akkoub tell stories of survival, resilience, and reciprocity with the land. By archiving these recipes alongside the Eco-dispersal Device, the project resists erasure, preserving both ecological and cultural heritage.

This intertwining of food sovereignty, foraging, and rewilding offers a vision for Beirut and beyond: one where food systems are localized, ecosystems are revitalized, and relationships with nature are restored. It invites individuals to become active caretakers of their surroundings, rediscovering the land’s abundance while resisting systems that perpetuate scarcity.

The Cooking Process: Rewilding Through Care

The Eco-dispersal Device combines natural materials - clay, soil, algae powder, coffee grounds, beeswax, compost, and pine resin - with foraged wild seeds to form eco-capsules that nourish and release plants over time. The layers are carefully composed to decompose gradually, allowing the seeds to sprout and flourish in their environment.

Dimension      3x3x3.25” 

Cooking time    2 hours                                 

Cure time       36 hours

Servings         4 devices

Ingredients 

Clay 400g

Ground Coffee 60g

Pine Resin 300g

Beeswax 100g

Wild Seeds 30g

Preparation: 

1. Flora Observation – Investigate the flora around you and collect wild seeds indigenous to that landscape.

Research and explore locally and in-season forageable flora.

2. Ecosystem Observation – Observe the ecology of the flora and fauna of your immediate surroundings to understand relationships between different organisms and their ecosystem.

Cooking: 

1. Mold the Upper Layer 

Mix locally sourced clay with algae powder and coffee grounds. Cast the clay in a mold of choice (suggested mold: Conical shape). Bake in the oven at low heat to expedite the curing process (suggested temperature & time, 300 degrees fahrenheit for 1 hour, turn off the oven and let the molds cure in the cooling oven. 

Note:

This layer will naturally break down over a year, creating fertile soil ready to nurture the seeds preserved in the base.

2. Mold the Lower Layer 

Melt the pine resin and beeswax mixture over medium high heat using a bain-marie technique to avoid burning. Add foraged wild seeds and organic fertilizers ( compost or flower petals) to the liquified mixture and cast in your mold of choice (suggested mold: compartmentalized shallow tray). Powder coat the bottom of the cast base to prevent it from sticking to surfaces – use algae powder or dried clay. 

!Disclaimer!

Pine resin will clog sinks when cooled, be weary and dispose accordingly. Do not dispose via plumbing. Dispose in house plants or external landscapes.

Note:

The pine resin will slowly disintegrate over several years, releasing the seeds into the soil upon which the device is placed. The resin will also protect the seeds from microbial infection or other disturbances, ensuring they survive through germination and sprouting. 

Assembling

1. Assemble the Upper Layer on to the Lower Layer

Using non-toxic bio-glue (suggestion: Bearly Art Precision Craft Glue), attach the Upper Layer onto the Lower layer. Let dry for about an hour to ensure that both pieces remain connected and in place.

Plating: 

1. Deploy and Contribute to Re-Wildering

Deploy the eco-dispersal device in local, destroyed, and/or distressed landscapes. 

Promote the rewilding of colonized and/or depleted territories, creating thriving ecosystems that offer new prospects for personal, social, communal, political, agricultural, environmental, and economic development.

2. Disseminate, Share and Discuss 

Share the process with friends, family and local communities. Nurture the ecology that is thriving in order to protect it for future generations of humans and non-humans.

By following this recipe, individuals do more than mold capsules; they actively participate in healing their ecosystems. These devices are deployed in stressed landscapes across Lebanon, fostering biodiversity, restoring habitats, and challenging extractive relationships with the land.

From Beirut to the World

While deeply rooted in Lebanon’s struggles, the Eco-dispersal Device speaks to global crises of food insecurity, ecological depletion, and disconnected urban landscapes. In New York City, for example, the project adapts to focus on rewilding urban environments by dispersing pollinator plants. It addresses greenwashing aesthetics while reconnecting urban dwellers with the native ecology of Lenapehoking. Whether in Beirut’s stressed soils or NYC’s concrete jungles, the device offers a pathway to ecological resilience and care.

Conclusion: Rewilding as Hope

In a time when systems fail and landscapes suffer, Foraging Alternative Ecosystems offers both a tool and a philosophy: rewilding as a form of resistance, healing, and empowerment. For Beirut, where the collapse of economic and governmental systems has made food insecurity a pressing reality, reimagining our relationship with the land is no longer a choice but a necessity. Through foraging and rewilding, individuals reclaim their agency, their history, and their ecosystems, offering a hopeful vision for the future—one seed, one recipe, and one landscape at a time.

This project was made possible with generous support from Beirut Makers, 6th Tallinn Architecture Biennale is titled “Edible; Or, The Architecture of Metabolism” (curated by Lydia Kallipoliti, Areti Markopoulou in collaboration with Chief Local Advisor Ivan Sergejev.), NEW INC, and Majlis NYC.