A Vertical Garden For Your Desk! - Orchid Board

epiphyte78 · #1 11-19-2013, 10:23 PM

How many of you are already familiar with the concept of vertical gardens? Here's a vertical garden that I took a photo of at Flora Grubb nursery in San Francisco...

Flora Grubb Vertical Garden Succulents by epiphyte78, on Flickr

Flora Grubb is a really neat nursery because it's by far the most vertically oriented nursery that I know of.

A significant portion of the growing popularity of vertical gardens stems from the spectacular vertical gardens of Patrick Blanc. He's created vertical gardens all over the world and written a book on the subject...The Vertical Garden: From Nature to the City. If you look on his website under "Inspiration" you'll see a link to a page that he has dedicated to photos of epiphytes in nature.

A couple decades before Patrick Blanc started creating vertical gardens...Bill Paylen created an amazing vertical garden here in Southern California. Unlike Blanc though, trees, rather than walls, were Paylen's canvas. You can read about his garden here...Growing Orchids Outdoors in Southern California.

Even though I lived relatively close to Bill Paylen, I had no idea he even existed until many years later. So as a high school kid I killed countless Cattleyas while struggling to reinvent the wheel. But I finally managed to learn the basics. Here's a recent photo of my tree...

Cattleya Portia coerulea by epiphyte78, on Flickr

Whether a garden is on a tree...or a wall...I love it! Vertical gardens allow so much more value and interest to be added to a space! Needless to say I was really excited when I recently learned about a project that can go a long way to helping people think epiphytically.

Up in Washington a fellow named Everett Carney (Alive and Modern) created a living wall that can easily fit on a desk. There's no pump...water works its way up the wall via wicking (capillary action). Initially I thought that plants could be attached to both sides of the wall...but it turns out that they can only be planted on one side. Perhaps a two sided model will be available in the future if there's sufficient demand.

Living Wall Final by AliveAndModern, on Flickr

As many of you already know...part of the challenge of growing plants mounted indoors is that you have to worry about water dripping everywhere. Everett's living wall provides an effective solution to this problem. Plus, it's really easy to attach plants to the wall...

Living Wall Product Overview - YouTube

I haven't yet had a chance to test the wall out for myself...but the concept is solid and definitely worth supporting. The world would certainly be a much better place if more walls and trees had a wide range of plants growing on them!

If you'd like this project to succeed...then here are some ways that you can help...

Email your friends and family
Post it on facebook/twitter
Like Alive and Modern on facebook
Follow Alive and Modern on Youtube, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and Flickr
Create a blog entry on the project
Write an article for your society's newsletter
Contribute $1 or more to Everett's Kickstarter project

To be clear, I am not affiliated with this project in any formal/official way. I'm helping to promote it because I love the idea of making vertical gardens really simple, accessible and low maintenance. As it stands, the desktop living wall isn't cheap ($135 with shipping included)...but if there's sufficient demand...the cost should come down over time.

I'll share a link to this thread with Everett so please feel free to reply with any questions or suggestions. If you have any photos of vertical gardens I'd certainly love to see them!

Here are some links that might be of some interest...

Are there any other "outside the pot" pages that you find inspiring?

Bobits · #2 11-19-2013, 10:29 PM

Your tree is spectacular

WhiteRabbit · #3 11-20-2013, 06:37 PM

Cool!

Leafmite · #4 11-20-2013, 07:05 PM

Really neat!

GardenTheater · #5 11-20-2013, 07:23 PM

Your tree looks wonderful. Also like the desktop garden.

ALToronto · #6 11-21-2013, 05:40 PM

Ugh, another fungus-breeding cesspool design. Why do people think that stagnant water is ok for plants? There seems to be no convenient way to run the water through the reservoir, which means that as some water evaporates, more is added to the basin, and some of it remains there forever, concentrating whatever fertilizer is used. Before long, bacteria take over and molds start to proliferate. Either that, or you're taking out the board with the plants and cleaning the basin at least once a week.

And this for $135? That's an absurd amount for a stupidly simplistic and not just inefficient, but in the long run, harmful, design. Where is the 'dislike' button?

gardenbeet · #7 11-23-2013, 06:40 AM

AlToronto - good point - perhaps if a hole and plug was added to the base of the reservoir the design would be OK?

The designers would probably welcome a critique - assuming of course there is no hole already designed into the system.

ALToronto · #8 11-23-2013, 09:34 AM

And that's the problem with desktop designs - you simply can't have water flowing out. Or you'd have to redesign the desk itself in order to accommodate the plants.

epiphyte78 · #9 11-23-2013, 03:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ALToronto

Ugh, another fungus-breeding cesspool design.

Yeah, because orchids detest all fungus...

Quote:

Originally Posted by ALToronto

Why do people think that stagnant water is ok for plants?

Maybe it's because they've successfully grown plants via semi-hydroponics?

Quote:

Originally Posted by ALToronto

There seems to be no convenient way to run the water through the reservoir, which means that as some water evaporates, more is added to the basin, and some of it remains there forever, concentrating whatever fertilizer is used. Before long, bacteria take over and molds start to proliferate. Either that, or you're taking out the board with the plants and cleaning the basin at least once a week.

Or you're making the monumental effort to apply some Physan 20.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ALToronto

And this for $135? That's an absurd amount for a stupidly simplistic and not just inefficient, but in the long run, harmful, design. Where is the 'dislike' button?

It's one thing to perceive problems...it's another thing to have the mindset that there aren't any solutions. There's always solutions...just like there's always room for improvement.

A desk without any plants has plenty of room for improvement. One problem with a desk though is that space is extremely limited. One solution is to grow plants vertically rather than horizontally. Everett is allocating resources towards this solution. His design isn't perfect...but it's a significant step in the right direction.

ALToronto · #10 11-23-2013, 06:03 PM

I'm well aware that there are beneficial micorrhyzal fungi without which some orchids cannot even survive. However, that's not the fungi that will grow in this desktop setup. And Physan 20? I'm sure it's completely harmless to plants and people, and every casual buyer of this desktop "garden" will know that it's needed, where to buy it, and how to use it safely.

The thing is, people who would know how to use Physan 20 would never buy this setup - they would buy some Hygrolon and set one up themselves, for less than $20. Those who will shell out $135 will know next to nothing about plants, much less fungicides - they'll just think it's a cool thing to have, and the plants in it will take care of themselves. This design needs to be a lot more idiot-resistant in order to be successful.

A desk is hardly a suitable place for a water-holding vessel. This isn't to say that one couldn't grow plants on a desktop, but it would mean a modification of the desk itself, and that would cost a lot more than $135.