2026 Hybrid Body Lab Artist-in-Residence Project Series 

This series of projects is from the Hybrid Body Lab Artist-in-Residence 2026, created by hair artist Lauren Hooks.

Garden Rows

An ode to enslaved ancestors who braided seeds into their hair as an act of survival and self-determination. Inspired by Living Loom, Garden Rows explores hair as a site of cultivation. Microgreen seeds—chia, purple cabbage, mustard, arugula, and kohlrabi—are encapsulated in a sodium alginate biofilm, then embedded within braided hair to sprout.
The work imagines coarse, curly hair as a hydroponic environment capable of sustaining life. Sunlight, moisture, and nutrients nourish both plant and scalp, positioning the body as an ecosystem. Garden Rows is a meditation on survival, memory, and human–plant symbiosis.

Dancing Hair

A sculptural dedication to hard working Queens who persist despite the occasional discomfort that they experience such as headaches. Challenging the phrase “heavy is the head that wears the crown,” Dancing Hair combines old and new remedies to reimagine the crown as both adornment and relief.
Shape memory alloy coils and green aventurine beads work together to activate acupressure points at the temples, apex, and base of the skull offering compression, cooling, and energetic support. Braids and beads form the structure, concealing an embedded system that sends programmed, rhythmic electrical signals to trigger compression within the coils. Inspired by Knitdema, the piece merges ancestral styling with therapeutic technology.

Crown Sense

Crown Sense centers Black women who wear sewn-in extensions over braided foundations. With limited airflow, these styles can trap moisture after washing, especially in denser hair. When braids remain damp, the scalp and hair become vulnerable to bacteria and mold in a warm, enclosed environment.
The piece embeds three silver-plated nylon threads within each braid at the crown which is the area most prone to retaining hidden moisture. These conductive threads measure changes in electrical resistance, which decreases in the presence of water, allowing the system to detect dampness within the hair structure.
At the core of the work is a reimagined hair pick, inspired by the African Plai Na, a wooden comb traditionally used to create clean parts for braiding. Here, that cultural form becomes both housing and interface as the embedded microcontroller translates moisture data into a color-coded LED signal, indicating levels of dryness in real time.
Crown Sense transforms hair into a sensing system—making the invisible visible, and care more precise.