Something I have been truly excited about in the urban landscape lately is the emergence of vertical gardens. Architects and urban planners are realizing the importance of green space, both for aesthetic reasons but also to provide the city with some extra lungs, helping its dwellers breathe easier.

A project of SEA (Social Environmental Aesthetics), the Vertical Gardens exhibition at Exit Art in New York City features architectural models, renderings, drawings, photographs and ephemera that depict or imagine a vertical farm, urban garden or green roof.

When entering the basement space, you are greeted by an actual, living green wall that, on opening day, seemed to have turned into an impromptu photo backdrop. The space was hot and crowded (not unlike our planet) with people of all ages. It’s very exciting to see this urban artform get such great attention, not to mention exhibition space in a gallery.

Over 20 projects are featured, some are real, some conceptual, but all make you imagine the endless possibilities that exist for implementing vertical gardens, green walls, rooftop gardens and green roofs in all major cities across the world. After today, I will never be able to look at a barren rooftop or windowless wall again and not see a canvas in need of invigorating plantlife.

I think we are all in agreement that we need greener urban environments. City planners are starting to recognize all the benefits as well, rainwater runoff collection being a major one. Having lived in often torrential Miami for a while I have seen streets flood in mere minutes because nature has been paved over and the masses of water have nowhere to go. Vertical farms and gardens are also being envisioned as a new way to feed freshly frown, local and organic foods to urbanites. Imagine the Greenmarket actually being held in a garden. It could be reality in a very near future, bringing people together around something we all care about — food. Eating well should not be a luxury or sacrifice, which is why we need solutions like these so badly.

Buildings and institutions worldwide — from the Musée du Quai Branly in Paris, to the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco, to Queens Botanical Garden in New York City — have embraced green walls or roofs for all their economical, environmental, and aesthetic values. These parts of buildings have been neglected for too long. It’s time to give New Yorkers (and their fellow city dwellers throughout the world) a reason to look up.

The exhibition is curated by Papo Colo, Jeanette Ingberman, Herb Tam and Lauren Rosati and is on display at Exit Art until May 23. Public programs, held around Earth Day, include lectures by Dickson D. Despommier, Professor of Public Health in Environmental Health Sciences and Microbiology at Columbia University and James Wines, Founder/President of SITE, Environmental Design, poetry by Jonathan Skinner, and an indoor composting workshop hosted by The Lower East Side Ecology Center.

Top photo by: laurenatclemson (Creative Commons).

March 30, 2009