As we round the corner from 2012 to 2013, I want to stop and thank all my readers, subscribers, and social media followers for visiting Urban Gardens since it’s launch in 2009, and for supporting my vision for blending together … Read More...
The Year’s 20 Best: Urban Gardens 2012 Roundup!
Urban Vertical Farm and Pick-it-Yourself Market
When industrial designer Ben Green and grower Tyler Nevers saw a need for suppling urban food-loving folks with locally grown produce at reasonable prices, they devised a plan and successfully raised $25,000 on Kickstarter for a small scale urban “artisan” … Read More...
Organic Concrete For Living Green Facades
Spanish researchers have developed a living concrete that may define a new method for creating vertical gardens and living walls on building facades. Capturing rainwater, the multilayered cement encourages and sustains the growth and viability of specific mosses and … Read More...
New Twist on Home Hydroponic Gardening
Honey, I’m home. Is the lettuce ready? This planter is a great concept for producing food with minimal effort in tight urban spaces.
Milan designer Stefania Minnella’s vertical self-sustaining hydroponic system, Elica Idroponica, automates all the tasks busy people might … Read More...
How to Grow an Energy-Saving Living Curtain
Green curtains outside the Arakawa City Hall in Tokyo, Japan.Photo, Bloomberg.
Anticipating rising energy costs after Japan’s nuclear disaster, and inspired by the green curtains on the facades of many municipal and commercial buildings, many Tokyo residents have created DIY … Read More...
Green Walled Facade Conceals Building’s Mechanicals
Plants pop through small holes of the die-cast aluminum panels that punctuate the living facade of Green Cast, a mixed-use building in Odawara, Japan.
Designed by architects Kengo Kuma & Associates, the building’s slightly slanted panels are formed over … Read More...
Growing Up: A Guide to Great Gardens in Small Spaces
Living in the middle of a bustling city doesn’t have to mean you can’t create a gorgeous garden space, no matter how tiny your outdoor area may be.
As long as you have a spot with a little … Read More...
Green Walls and Living Sculpture Blend Art and Fashion
Complex and intricate living art arrangements composed of thousands of plants climb the interior walls of of Isetan Shinjuku, one of Japan’s oldest department stores.
For a recent unveiling of the store’s “Fashion Museum” botanical artist Makota Azuma’s The Art … Read More...
Hanging Garden Lamps Green Up Interiors
One of my favorite Brooklyn artisan-makers is the collaborative design studio, Autumn Workshop, whose Scrap Ecology lighting we featured a while back. The studio creates a variety of lighting that derives its inspiration from biophilia, the natural connection between … Read More...
Sustainable High-Rise Greens Sydney Skyline
While action toward building ‘greener’ more sustainable structures is gaining momentum in Europe and America, an office tower from down-under is putting Australia on the green buildings map.
A 30 story high-rise office tower in Sydney, Australia’s central business district, … Read More...
3D Printed Planter Bricks
Now you can print and plant a brick.
Planter Bricks are 3D printed concrete masonry units that double as vessels for growing plants and vegetation.
Created by Emerging Objects, a design and research subsidiary of Rael San Fratello Architects specializing … Read More...
Hydroponic Wine Bottle Wall Garden at Student Bar
Conceived as part wine rack and part hydroponics, a hydroponic bottle wall garden will spout from April 7-24 in the lower bar of a local Cornell University campus area venue, Stella’s Bar and Restaurant.
Architecture students Peter Gudonis and Carly … Read More...
Simple Unfolding Planter
Yonoh Studio’s Tyvek Opot wall planter arrives rolled in a tube.
You simply slip out and can fold it and hang it up on a wall in a matter of minutes via its two symmetrically placed eyelets.
Place a planted … Read More...
How to Build Indoor Hydroponic Gardens Using IKEA Storage Boxes
Hey apartment and small space dwellers, here’s an easy DIY compact hydroponic indoor farm system you can make with repurposed off-the-shelf IKEA storage boxes.
ELIOOO is not a product, it’s architect and designer Antonio Scarponi’s cleverly conceived and designed instruction … Read More...
Hanging Kitchen Herb Garden Doubles as Light Fixture
Landscape designer, Thibaut Delefortrie, and product designer, Eugénie Pfeil, combined creative forces to bring the garden into the kitchen, a collaboration that resulted in Klorofyll, a suspended light fixture that doubles as a hanging kitchen garden for growing aromatic herbs.… Read More...
Ten Futuristic Garden Tools
A slew of high-tech weapons could soon occupy home gardeners’ arsenals. From soil humidity sensors, to computer-generated growing tips, to weather detection devices, these contraptions challenge the notion that plants need a human touch.
Whether you’ve mastered indoor herbs, wrestled … Read More...
My Private “Vegitecture” Tour of Jardí Tarradellas, Barcelona’s Tallest Residential Vertical Garden
These days we find gardens in unconventional places, from highway median dividers to old parking lots. The City of Barcelona has elevated growing plants in unlikely places to an art form, transforming newly exposed party walls into lush vertical gardens, … Read More...
Farm Kitchen Blends Micro-Agriculture and Design at London’s 100% Design
Mood board by The Farm Kitchen’s designers, Mette.
As a testament to the prevailing interest in countertop gardening and indoor farming, a conceptual kitchen environment showcasing micro-agriculture will be a key feature at this year’s 100% Design 2013 during the … Read More...
The post Farm Kitchen Blends Micro-Agriculture and Design at London’s 100% Design appeared first on Urban Gardens.
Experiencing Girona Through Its Legends
What I love about travel is that it is about more than place, it’s about storytelling. Through stories, we as visitors begin to absorb the essence of where we are, both historically and in the moment, and most importantly within … Read More...
The post Experiencing Girona Through Its Legends appeared first on Urban Gardens.
Végétagère Modular Container Gardening System by Frédéric Malphettes
Végétagère, a hybrid plant trellis shelving system composed of modular wood shelves with openings to accept stackable vegetable fiber pots, debuted at last spring’s Jardins Jardin, the edgy urban garden design show in Paris’s Tuilleries Gardens.
Parisian designer Frédéric Malphettes… Read More...
The post Végétagère Modular Container Gardening System by Frédéric Malphettes appeared first on Urban Gardens.