The Next Epoch Seed Library (NESL) is an artist-run seed saving project focused on the novel, spontaneous, and adaptable plants known as weeds. Founded in 2015 by Ellie Irons and Anne Percoco, the project focuses on collecting, storing and sharing seeds from these plants, which tend to live in close association with dense human populations. Our collection sites include areas heavily impacted by human activity, such as vacant lots, street verges, superfund sites and abandoned infrastructure. Through presentations, workshops, seed-swaps and exhibitions, NESL encourages viewers and participants to engage with their local habitat and reflect on their own role in the adaptation and success of these plants. Offering services like soil stabilization, moisture retention, heat island reversal, and toxic bioaccumulation, these disturbance-adapted plants help heal wounds inflicted by a changing climate and make neighborhoods more liveable for human and non-human residents alike. This summer, 2023, NESL has a temporary home at the Five Corners Library in Jersey City, NJ.

NESL is highly adaptable and can take many forms: from site-specific sculpture; to public events and workshops; to documentation in the form of maps, photographs, video and drawings; to an online searchable, mail-order inventory; to plant propogation.

If you’re interested in participating by donating seeds to the project, or if you would like to order seeds, please get in touch: nextepochseedlibrary (at) gmail (dot) com.

Next Epoch Seed Library installation at William Paterson University, Spring 2016