Thursday 22 October 2026

Sunday BestJournal
Voxel Series-1

Tuesday Labs debuts Voxel Series-1 household chore robot

The New York company's counter-height robot can water plants and sweep crumbs, and first units will go to early adopters for $20,000.

By Clara Whitlow Food and drink correspondent

2 min read

Close-up of Voxel's face: a yellow box with two square LED eyes.
Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)
Voxel holding a clarinet across its body in a sunlit room.
Voxel holding a clarinet across its body in a sunlit room. Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)
Voxel standing in a kitchen with numbered markers on its arms, legs, head, and chest.
Voxel standing in a kitchen with numbered markers on its arms, legs, head, and chest. Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)
Six expression studies of an orange robot head with different speaker mouths.
Six expression studies of an orange robot head with different speaker mouths. Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)
Storyboard sketch of a robot stretching its arms back to relax beside a guitar.
Storyboard sketch of a robot stretching its arms back to relax beside a guitar. Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)
Control panel with a round red button, a toggle, a dial, and a house icon.
Control panel with a round red button, a toggle, a dial, and a house icon. Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)
Render of a brown wooden robot with glowing eyes.
Render of a brown wooden robot with glowing eyes. Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)
Turnaround of four orange robot designs.
Turnaround of four orange robot designs. Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)
Pencil sketch of a crouching robot with long jointed legs.
Pencil sketch of a crouching robot with long jointed legs. Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)
Pencil sketch of a curled-up robot.
Pencil sketch of a curled-up robot. Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)
Voxel on a workbench in the Tuesday Labs studio, with a member of the team behind him.
Voxel on a workbench in the Tuesday Labs studio, with a member of the team behind him. Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)
A braided cable running between Voxel's yellow and pink body panels.
A braided cable running between Voxel's yellow and pink body panels. Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)

Tuesday Labs, a New York company founded in 2025, has introduced Voxel Series-1, its first semi-autonomous home robot. [1] The machine is counter-height and designed to stay away from the "uncanny valley" look of a humanoid. [1]

Voxel can water plants and sweep crumbs, currently through a combination of autonomous intelligence and teleoperation, according to the company. [1] A colorful matte plastic shell covers cuboid body parts, with LED eyes and one-degree-of-freedom grippers for hands. [1] Founder Rosalind Shinkle, previously an engineer at Boston Dynamics, worked with former Pixar character designer Alonso Martinez on the design. [1] Early ideas drew on home objects such as lamps, chairs and briefcases. [1] Shinkle called the result a mix of "exceptional capability and charming character." [1] The plastic shell is intended to keep the robot relatively lightweight, and Shinkle said the exterior should also communicate quality. [1]

Shinkle said the team deliberately avoided a humanoid form. [1] "We wanted to stay far from the uncanny valley, and far from robots that fill a human-shaped space in the home," she said. [1] "Instead, we made Voxel relatively small and cuboid, to signal his role in your life: a droid butler, not a human butler." [1] The robot's appearance is meant to sit at roughly the same point on what Shinkle called a "human-toaster spectrum." [1]

Orange block robot model waving, with a top view of its fist.
Orange block robot model waving, with a top view of its fist. Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)

Five design principles guided Voxel: easy integration into the home, a maximalist appearance, simplicity, luxury and playfulness. [1] Shinkle also described "affordance matching," meaning someone who sees the robot should be able to roughly predict what it can do. [1] "If you correctly match perceived and actual affordance, you can avoid that constant feeling of disappointment when a humanoid robot isn't quite as good at doing things as a human," she said. [1]

Grey robot model with a boxy head, antlers, and long bent legs.
Grey robot model with a boxy head, antlers, and long bent legs. Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)

Tuesday Labs will start with a limited number of robots for early adopters who choose to help train Voxel's autonomous software at home. [1] The estimated price is $20,000. [1] Shinkle said that makes Voxel a luxury product, but the company's ambition is to make household robots accessible to far more people as technology improves and production scales. [1]

Sheet of robot character line drawings.
Sheet of robot character line drawings. Photograph: Tuesday Labs (press image)

The robot runs on a rechargeable battery and charges at a home docking station as part of its normal routine. [1] Shinkle said her own dislike of cleaning helped drive the project: "I hate cleaning my apartment, and I'd much rather spend my time building something that solves that problem once and for all." [1] Tuesday Labs focuses on robots that feel natural and delightful to live with, in a broader field that includes Neo by 1X Technologies and CLOiD by LG. [1]

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Clara Whitlow

Food and drink correspondent

Clara Whitlow covers restaurants, cooking and the people behind them for Sunday Best. She writes from published reporting and announcements, and does not review restaurants.