Seen here is a fascinating example of an ‘espaliered’ fruit tree in North Cave, England; which according to Wikipedia:
Espalier is the horticultural practice of controlling woody plant growth for the production of fruit, by pruning and tying branches to a frame, frequently in formal patterns, flat against a structure such as a wall, fence, or trellis.
Espaliers, trained into flat two-dimensional forms, are ideal not only for decorative purposes, but also for gardens in which space is limited. In a temperate climate, they may be planted next to a wall that can reflect more sunlight and retain heat overnight or planted so that they absorb maximum sunlight by training them parallel to the equator. These two facts allow the season to be extended so that fruit has more time to mature.
This particular tree can be found running up the side of a house in North Cave, England. You can see it on Google Street View here.
Designed by Perkins+Will’s Global Design Director Ralph Johnson, the recently opened Shanghai Natural Museum features an incredible oval pool and courtyard that will surely wow visitors for many years to come.
The 44,517 square meter (479,180 square foot) museum offers visitors the opportunity to explore the natural world through the display of more than 10,000 artifacts from all seven continents. The building includes exhibit spaces, a 4D theater, an outdoor exhibit garden, and a 30-meter (98 ft) tall atrium that welcomes visitors with an abundance of natural light filtered through a striking glass wall inspired by the cellular structure of plants and animals.
For more information on the museum’s architecture and design, visit ArchDaily.
Situated within Washington Park, the 5.5 acre Japanese Garden is composed of five distinct garden styles: flat garden, strolling pond garden, tea garden, natural garden and the sand and stone garden.
Designed by Professor Takuma Tono, the garden first opened to the public in 1967 and is widely regarded as one of the best Japanese Gardens outside of Japan.
For those unfamiliar, Tom Anderson, the co-founder of MySpace, has built a huge online following for his amazing travel photography. You can find many more of his incredible travel photos on Google+
American artist Stan Herd has been creating large-scale land art for over 40 years. From the artist’s 160 acre portrait of Kiowa Chief Satanta in 1981 through 35 monumental earthworks over the next 40 years, Stan Herd is known as the ‘Father of Crop Art’, a term coined by Dan Rather on CBS evening news.
Inspired by ancient designs in England and Peru, the artist’s work also followed on the heels of American land based artists Christo, Heizer, Smithson and Walter de Maria. The influential artist is also credited for inspiring the amazing rice field artists in Inakadate, Japan (featured previously) after his work was featured on several highly popular Japanese television shows.
Herd’s latest artwork (seen above) was commissioned by the Minneapolis Institute of Art (MIA) and saw the artist recreate a planted version of Van Gogh’s famous artwork, Olive Trees. Planting began this past Spring and will remain intact through Autumn. The field location was chosen specifically so that the growing art can be seen from many flights coming and going from MSP airport.
Below you will find some examples of Herd’s fantastic artworks along with a video about the Olive Trees project with the MIA.
It’s the first food ever grown, harvested and eaten in space by NASA crew members.
Astronauts Scott Kelly, Kjell Lindgren and Kimiya Yui of Japan sample the fruits of their labor after harvesting a crop of “Outredgeous” red romaine lettuce from the Veggie plant growth system on the International Space Station.
Before consumption the leafy greens are cleaned with citric acid-based, food safe sanitizing wipes. Half of the crop will be consumed while the other half will be packaged and frozen until it can be returned to Earth for scientific analysis. Check out the embedded video below for the first official tasting! [source]
NASA is maturing Veggie technology aboard the space station to provide future pioneers with a sustainable food supplement – a critical part of NASA’s Journey to Mars. As NASA moves toward long-duration exploration missions farther into the solar system, Veggie will be a resource for crew food growth and consumption. It also could be used by astronauts for recreational gardening activities during deep space missions.
The first pillows were activated, watered and cared for by Expedition 39 flight engineer Steve Swanson in May 2014. After 33 days of growth, the plants were harvested and returned to Earth in October 2014. At NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the plants underwent food safety analysis. The second Veg-01 plant pillows were activated by Kelly on July 8 and grew again for 33 days before being harvested. The seeds had been on the station for 15 months before being activated. [source]
If we plan on exploring great distances in space, growing our own food will be integral.
The collapsible and expandable Veggie unit features a flat panel light bank that includes red, blue and green LEDs for plant growth and crew observation. Using LED lights to grow plants was an idea that originated with NASA as far back as the late 1990s.
The purple/pinkish hue surrounding the plants in Veggie is the result of a combination of the red and blue lights, which by design emit more light than the green LEDs. Green LEDS were added so the plants look like edible food rather than weird purple plants. [source]
Studio Ayaskan have created a pot that grows as the plant does; using an origami-based geometry design.
Twin sisters Bike and Begum Ayaskan are a design duo with a focus on products and installations. In a recent project entitled, GROWTH, the duo created a flower pot with origami-based geometry that grows in size as the plant does. The duo explain:
“The life cycle of a plant is a transformation, from an early seed to its full grown size; the blooming of a flower, the unfolding of a leaf, the branching of the roots. This process is what GROWTH aims to capture within a plant pot.”
For more interesting designs from Studio Ayaskan, check them out at the links below.
Photographer Nomi Oranchuk took this beautiful shot of a black velvet petunia at Butchart Gardens on Vancouver Island, Canada. The photo was shared yesterday by her on reddit where it reached the front page and has been viewed over 1.6 million times!
Equally awesome was this reply image by fellow reddit user Fotoshap which reverses the idea.
Japanese art collective teamLab have created an incredible floating flower garden installation featuring over 2,300 living flowers in bloom. TeamLab adds:
When a viewer gets close to this flower-filled space, the flowers close to the viewer rise upwards all at once, creating a hemispherical space with the viewer at its center. In other words, although the whole space is filled with flowers, a hemispherical space is constantly being created with the viewer at its center and the viewer is free to move around wherever they want. If many viewers get close to one another, the dome spaces link up to form one single space. [source]
The interactive art exhibit is currently on display at the National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation in Tokyo until May 10, 2015. For more exhibit information visit here. To see more interesting projects from teamLab check out their official site here.
Set against the eastern slopes of Cape Town’s Table Mountain, Kirstenbosch is the first botanic garden in the world to be included within a natural World Heritage Site. Established in 1913 the 36 hectare garden is part of a larger 528 hectare nature reserve.
To herald the 100th anniversary of Kirstenbosch in 2013, the Centenary Tree Canopy Walkway was built in 2013-14 , and opened to the public on 17 May 2014.
The Centenary Tree Canopy Walkway is a new curved steel and timber bridge that winds and dips its way through and over the trees of the Arboretum. Inspired by a snake skeleton, and informally called ‘The Boomslang’ (meaning tree snake), it is a low-maintenance, low-impact sculptural raised walkway.
The project is a collaboration between Mark Thomas Architects and Engineers Henry Fagan & Partners consulting engineers. The walkway is 130 m (427 ft) long, touching the forest floor in two places, and raises visitors to 12 m above ground (39 ft)
The main spine of the walkway is tubular steel, with welded ribs and a light mesh giving the cross bracing, allowing the whole form to act as a bridge-spanning beam. The decking is stained, treated, slatted pine, placed on edge and spaced to accommodate the walkway’s curves.
The structure was pre-fabricated in 6 m lengths that were hoisted by crane and bolted together on site. This caused minimal disruption to the trees during assembly and reduced construction time in the Garden. The foundations are submerged, hand-dug, reinforced concrete pads in select positions, approximately 12 m (39 ft) apart.
Established in 1913, Kirstenbosch was the world’s first botanic garden to be devoted to a country’s indigenous fauna. Kirstenbosch lies in the heart of the Cape Floristic Region, also known as the Cape Floral Kingdom. In 2004 the Cape Floristic Region, including Kirstenbosch, was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Reddit user odstane recently shared a series of photos of his backyard frozen pond. The frozen water created some interesting patterns drawing comparisons to a Japanese rock garden or the contour lines on a map (used to show elevation).
If any of our knowledgeable readers can explain why this occurs (in simple terms!), let us know in the comments below and we can update the post accordingly!
