Many new mixed-use developments are beginning to use food as a luring, featured amenity. Farm-to-table restaurants and organic gardens are beginning to replace past amenities such as golf courses, but this has primarily been for more rural, or at least, suburban, developments.
While the farm-to-table restaurants are beginning to pop up in more neighborhoods across dense cities, and rooftop urban farms are growing in popularity, space in urban landscapes is still at a premium. But, as inhabitat.com reports, the Danish group Space10, in association with architects Mads-Ulrik Husum and Sine Lindholm have developed a prototype that could help people in urban areas produce more of their own food while also providing a return to nature for cities.
Their prototype, Growroom, was recently showcased at the Chart Art Fair in Copenhagen as a piece of agricultural architecture. Growroom is a spherical structure made of metal framework that holds planter boxes. By dividing the sphere into overlapping slices, in ensures water and light can reach all of the vegetation.
Additionally, the sphere can double as a public space for individuals to take a seat and escape the sun or the rain (the overlapping slices allow the plants to get rain and sun, but shield the individuals within).
Growroom is not a solution that will allow cities to grow all of their own food, but that was never the goal of the project. “With the Growroom, we want to spark conversations about how we can bring nature back into our cities, grow our own food, and tackle the rapidly increasing demand for significantly more food in the future,” Space10 writes on their website.
For even more information on the Growroom, click here.
Related Stories
| Apr 16, 2013
5 projects that profited from insulated metal panels
From an orchid-shaped visitor center to California’s largest public works project, each of these projects benefited from IMP technology.
| Apr 12, 2013
Nation's first 'food forest' planned in Seattle
Seattle's Beacon Food Forest project is transforming a seven-acre lot in the city’s Beacon Hill neighborhood into a self-sustaining, edible public park.
| Apr 2, 2013
Green building consultant explores the truth about green building performance in new book
A new book from leading sustainability, green building author and expert Jerry Yudelson challenges assumptions about the value of sustainable design and environmentally-friendly buildings.
| Mar 29, 2013
Stanford researchers develop nanophotonic panel that reflects sun's heat out of the atmosphere
Researchers at Stanford University have developed a nanophotonic material that not only reflects sunlight, but actually beams the thermal energy out of the earth's atmosphere.
| Mar 27, 2013
Small but mighty: Berkeley public library’s net-zero gem
The Building Team for Berkeley, Calif.’s new 9,500-sf West Branch library aims to achieve net-zero—and possibly net-positive—energy performance with the help of clever passive design techniques.
| Mar 22, 2013
Earn $500 as a DOE proposal reviewer
The DOE'S Building Technologies Office this morning put out a call to the AEC industry for expert reviewers for its new energy-efficiency initiative for small commercial buildings, which make up more than 90% of the commercial building stock.
| Mar 21, 2013
Best Firms to Work For: Enermodal Engineering is green to the core
At Enermodal Engineering, there’s only one kind of building—a sustainable one.
| Mar 19, 2013
New LEED for Neighborhood Development and Historic Preservation guide released
A new guidance manual, LEED for Neighborhood Development and Historic Preservation, outlines strategies geared towards helping building teams incorporate historic resources into their developments.
| Mar 14, 2013
25 cities with the most Energy Star certified buildings
Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., and Chicago top EPA's list of the U.S. cities with the greatest number of Energy Star certified buildings in 2012.