Es Devlin: ‘Has everything I’ve made been worth the resources? Probably not’

‘Did you know,” asks Es Devlin, “that you can tell the difference between a wood pigeon and a collared dove from how it emphasises the syllables in its call?” She is sitting at a long table in her home and studio in south London, where big glass doors open on to a leafy garden, as the cooing of a wood pigeon drifts in on the breeze. A nearby table is piled high with pencil drawings of birds, beetles, butterflies and bats, while…