Imagine the Stone Age. You're perched on a tree, eyes scanning the dense underbrush. Every sense is sharp, tuned for survival. A rustle—your gaze snaps to movement. There, an animal breaks the stillness. It’s in focus, alive, and important. Everything else—leaves, branches, the forest itself—blurs into the background.

We've likely evolved this way: to notice animals and relegate plants to mere background. Perhaps that's why, despite their complexity, plants often feel less 'alive' to us. In fact, research shows that children often mistake plants for being non-living (Stavy & Wax, 1989). In academia, this inattentiveness has a name: Plant Awareness Disparity (Parsley, 2020)—a widely recognized phenomenon describing our inattentiveness to plants in our environment.

This bias may be deep rooted. A study of Palaeolithic cave art found that only 0.07% of the images depicted plants (Walton et al., 2023), suggesting our ancestors may been similarly inattentive to plants. Interestingly, this neglect appears less pronounced in later, more plant-dependent societies—such as early Aboriginal cultures—where nearly 25% of cave paintings feature plant life.

Disconcertingly, with modernisation, our disconnection from plants has deepened. Deforestation, shrunken green spaces, limited access to gardens due to the housing crisis, and the accelerating pace of modern life, have pushed plants further out of sight—and out of mind—than ever before. In a time of climate crisis and rising mental health struggles, perhaps our generation needs to slow down and reconnect. We could gain a lot by restoring our relationship with plants.

Plant 'Ensoulment'

In design, "ensoulment" refers to an object gaining deep emotional meaning—when it comes to life in the eyes of its user. Ensoulment invites attention, care, and emotional investment, encouraging longer-lasting, more meaningful relationships with objects (Jung et al., 2011). Think of a family heirloom, a childhood stuffed toy, a gift from a loved one, or something handmade.

Because plants can occupy a space between feeling inanimate and alive, they, too, in theory, may be approached like objects—and, in turn, ensouled. Practices like gardening, grafting, and bonsai are examples of this. Though they involve living plants, they draw on the same principles of craft usually applied to inanimate materials: shaping, tending, refining. Through time, care, and interaction, these practices can foster deep emotional connections—turning something once overlooked into something personally significant.

Literature on Plant Awareness Disparity points in the same direction: meaningful interaction with plants is one of the most effective ways to avert it (Nantawanit et al., 2011). That may explain why Aboriginal communities—whose survival depended on intimate knowledge of flora in their environment—chose to depict comparatively more plants in their cave art. But our world is different. Agriculture is industrialised, and most of us are far removed from it. So the question becomes: in a society where direct interaction with plants is no longer essential for immediate survival, how do we cultivate that connection anew?

To explore this question, I’m embarking on an autoethnographic journey of growing. As part of my PhD project under the supervision of Dr. Arno Verhoeven (Link) and Dr. Rachel Joy Harkness (Link), I’ll be participating in the Edinburgh Growing Together Project - Dumbiedykes (Link), ECA's Textile Program's Flax Garden, and the Goodies Charity's plant shop, immersing myself in the practices of care, attention, and craft that define plant-based interaction. Through this, I hope to better understand how we might restore our relationship with plants—both personally and collectively.

Bibliography

• Jung, H., Bardzell, S., Blevis, E., Pierce, J., & Stolterman, E. (2011). How Deep Is Your Love: Deep Narratives of Ensoulment and Heirloom Status. International Journal of Design, 5:1. ijdesign.org/index.php/IJDesign/article/view/854/329
  

• Parsley, K. M. (2020). Plant awareness disparity: A case for renaming plant blindness. Plants, People, Planet, 2(6), 598–601. doi.org/10.1002/ppp3.10153
  

• Nantawanit, N., Panijpan, B., & Ruenwongsa, P. (2011). Studying how plants defend themselves: A chemical weapon produced by chilli fruit. Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture, 91(14), 2467-2473. doi.org/10.1080/00219266.2011.553685
  

• Stavy, R., & Wax, N. (1989). Children’s Conceptions of Plants as Living Things. Human Development, 32(2), 88–94. jstor.org/stable/26767571
  

• Walton, G., Mitchley, J., Reid, G., & Batke, S. (2023). Absence of botanical European Palaeolithic cave art: What can it tell us about plant awareness disparity? Plants, People, Planet, 5(5), 690–697. doi.org/10.1002/ppp3.10373