Overview

Feral Clouds explores how data processing and storage systems operate under the dual challenges of technological competition and climate change. The lecture proposes a rethinking of digital culture away from efficiency‑driven models toward approaches that consider ecological impact, limits, and transformation. The project investigates digital infrastructure through its combination of activism and policy development work and design prototype testing and educational program activities. The concept of “ferality” serves two purposes as it describes how AI-focused industries develop excessive practices while it shows different ways to create energy and manage data. The study of low technology computation and permaculture principles and decay-based systems provides multiple perspectives. The lecture presents data infrastructure as a component that connects with both environmental systems and social systems. For related discussions, see our articles on architecture, urban design, and technology.

Event Details

Context

Marina Otero Verzier is an architect and researcher whose work intersects critical spatial practices, ecology, technology, and activism. She received the Wheelwright Prize for research on data storage futures, and her work explores alternative infrastructures that challenge conventional technological imaginaries. Her perspective connects design to broader environmental and social critique.

✦ ArchUp Editorial Insight

The research project Feral Clouds 2026 investigates three aspects of data infrastructures which operate under current technological and climate-related challenges. Marina Otero Verzier applies the concept of “ferality” to assess the excessive practices of the AI industry while investigating alternative solutions which include computing based on permaculture principles and the use of simple technological systems and the development of systems which support natural decay and transformation processes. The lecture establishes digital culture as an element of environmental and social systems while pushing designers and technologists to develop new models which focus on responsibility and resilience and their understanding of environmental impacts throughout time.

Closing Note

Feral Clouds 2026 invites participants to rethink digital infrastructure as an ecological and cultural concern, not just a technical one. The lecture demonstrates how data systems function in environmental and social contexts to shift design thinking from its current focus on efficiency toward responsible design practices which consider long-term consequences.

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