Last night I received news that a friend in Mexico died in a car crash over the weekend. I immediately checked his facebook page and saw the great outpouring of photos, love and wishes. Luis Alberto Matanzo touched the lives of so very many. He was a proud Poblano and a talented architect and landscape architect with great passion for his career and his culture. The world has indeed felt a great loss that reaches far and wide.

I had the great opportunity to meet Luis in 2007 when I was living in Mexico City and working at Grupo de Diseño Urbano. He even invited me on a personal tour of his hometown of Puebla which I will always remember. As a native of the only Spanish-designed city in Mexico, he taught me about the city’s history, design and the reason why Puebla was so famous for it’s tasty candy. I saw some of the most amazing churches, squares and hidden courtyards along with pedestrian streets and a converted art district followed by peculiar cocktail shots with bizarre (and tasty!) ingrediants and authentic molé under the arches of a sidewalk cafe just off the main plaza. We toured the ancient church built atop a pyramid of Cholula where we enjoyed the sun setting over the city followed by micheladas in the city square. Luis was so proud of his city and it’s culture and it showed. In a future post, I will share my trip and images from this beautiful city in honor of Luis.

But most importantly, Luis taught me the real story behind a famous Mexican holiday. As it turns out, back in the early 1900’s Hellmann’s mayonnaise was actually manufactured in England so when the Titanic set voyage it carried on board thousands of jars which were scheduled to be delivered in Vera Cruz on the Yucatan Peninsula after it left port in New York. The Mexican people, who were crazy about mayonnaise, were very excited and eagerly awaited the delivery which would have been the largest to the country. But as history had it, the ship sank upon hitting an ice berg and took the precious cargo down with it. The loss was so great for the Mexican people that they declared the day a national day of morning. To this day, the people continue to observe the day every year on May 5th and is known as the Sinko de Mayo.

Luis had a silly sense of humor. I remember walking along while he was telling this story in such a serious manner that I was actually totally surprised that it turned out to be a joke.

Luis had a kind personality and a warmth that was infectious. His charm and humor drew people to him like a magnet and kept people laughing and smiling. He was an inspiration and a friend. I feel lucky to have known him. Luis will be remembered and forever live on in the hearts of many.

Luis, te vamos a extañar. Te mando un abrazo super fuerte.

images via Lisa Town

Tucked away in an alley near Avenida Cinco de Mayo and Calle Palma within the historic district of Mexico City, a large and abundantly planted living wall is thriving. And even more than a lush vertical greening system, this wall seems to be a piece of art as well. Woven in amongst the multi-colored vegetated stripes appears to be a dragon. This wall is downright fun.

The plants on the wall seem to be thriving in Mexico City’s climate and have been planted in some sort of unidentified container system that is attached in some way to the side of the existing building with what I can only guess are a few layers between the plants and the actual building face. Why this particular building was chosen, I don’t know but according to Erika Richmond, a designer from Vancouver, B.C. who happened upon the wall on accident while visiting the historic district, said that the shop owners told her that it was built by the municipal government. Designer and installation date unknown. Having been all over the historic district several times myself, the last time in the fall of 2007, I know I would’ve found it if it were there. That means I am going to make a guess that it was installed sometime in the last two years.

Given the information of being built by the municipal government, that leads me to think that this is part of Mexico City’s Plan Verde. Plan Verde is the municipal governments plan to green the city as a way to not only attack the serious air quality issues within the valley and the massive flooding during the rainy season but to also raise the quality of living for the people through enhanced public transportation and bike pathways. Perhaps this wall is a test wall by the government as part of Plan Verde, which might be why it’s hidden down an alley instead of out in a more open viewing area with informational signage to educate the public. I’ve been following along with Plan Verde prior to discovering this wall and will write more on that in a future post.

The wall maintains a hidden drip irrigation system that is then caught in a gutter at the bottom. This is rather important since people walk underneath the wall to enter and leave the shops that are open for business beneath the living wall. No business wants their customers to be dripped on. But it’s got to be pretty cool to step into a little place under the green wall to grab some lunch. I wonder how many other green walls are out there, hidden away where hardly anyone sees them or knows that they exist?

images via mfree, rhys, erika richmond, sas17, buildgreenman

I recently came across these photos on Flickr but can’t find any information on what this place is. The captions on the photos seem to indicate that this is a courtyard for a place called Café Nike in the Condesa neighborhood of Mexico City. From what I can tell from the photographs, it looks like it may be a cloth pocket style wall as opposed to units. It looks pretty lush and not brand new.

images via OmarOmar

I had to share this funny ad that I came across which seems to be using a living wall to promote a new women’s deodorant product from Rexona called Naturals. It’s probably fake leaves, I can’t tell for sure but either way, it’s funny how the idea of vertical greening is catching on even in the advertising world. The advertising agency was Lowe Ginkgo in Montevideo, Uruguay and came out in September 2009.

images via adsoftheworld

I have often feared what I would do if I lost the use of my hands. A friend once joked that if I couldn’t move my hands that I couldn’t talk effectively because I make so many motions with them when I talk. But all jokes aside, not being able to draw would be really difficult to deal with and even worse, just imagine the complete loss of movement in the entire body to an artist. This is exactly what happened to Tony Quan, a graffiti who was diagnosed with ALS in 2003, who helped in the development of the Eyewriter. This amazing discovery has allowed Tony to create graffiti art from the comfort of his bed that can then be projected onto a surface in any location.

Text from the Eyewriter website, “Members of Free Art and Technology (FAT), OpenFrameworks, the Graffiti Research Lab, and The Ebeling Group communities have teamed-up with a legendary LA graffiti writer, publisher and activist, named Tony Quan, aka TEMPTONE. Tony was diagnosed with ALS in 2003, a disease which has left him almost completely physically paralyzed… except for his eyes. This international team is working together to create a low-cost, open source eye-tracking system that will allow ALS patients to draw using just their eyes. The long-term goal is to create a professional/social network of software developers, hardware hackers, urban projection artists and ALS patients from around the world who are using local materials and open source research to creatively connect and make eye art.”

images via eyewriter

Based out of El Paso, Texas, a company called Valcent has been working on a vertical farming system called VertiCrop that they believe is even better and more cost-effective than traditional field agriculture because the system has produced “20 times the normal production volume and only requires 5% of the average water used in conventional growing conditions.” All the trays kind of remind of lunch period back in school.

Here’s how the VertiCrop high density vertical farming system works:

“The VertiCrop system grows plants in a suspended tray system moving on an overhead conveyor system. The system is designed to provide maximum sunlight and precisely correct nutrients to each plant. Ultraviolet light and filter systems exclude the need for herbicides and pesticides. Sophisticated control systems gain optimum growth performance through the correct misting of nutrients, the accurate balancing of PH and the delivery of the correct amount of heat, light and water.”

images via valcent

These aluminum and steel tables by Shanghai designer Zhili Liu are part of a collection called Shrub. The naturally inspired branching legs are attached to the table tops by exposed sunken screws which create a decorative detail in the surface of the aluminum table top.

images via dezeen

Last night my husband happily showed me a page in his Time Magazine, proud of himself for knowing who it was about, that displayed Patrick Blanc’s living walls as number 31 on the magazines 50 Best Inventions of the Year. It was accompanied by a photo of the recent Athenaeum Hotel in London.

Here’s the original text from Time, “Patrick Blanc specializes in vertical gardens: verdant patches that climb the walls of office buildings, shopping malls, museums and public spaces around the globe. His newest creation is the green-bearded exterior of the Athenaeum Hotel, on which some 260 species of plants (more than 12,000 in all) form a forest facade rising eight stories over London’s ritzy Mayfair district. Recognizing that not all plants need soil to grow, Blanc affixes synthetic felt to a frame onto which roots can cling. Part gardener, part botanist, Blanc uses automated irrigation and fertilization systems to keep his specimens healthy and arranges them so that each enjoys optimal growth conditions.”

And here’s an interview with the quirky and even then green-haired Patrick Blanc I found recently from back in 2007. It was conducted by a British interviewer and they even make reference to the future Athenaeum Hotel in saying that one of his designs was planned for London.

Description from Yale University, “For one week in May 2008, leading architects, professors, and students from Yale University, organized by the Yale Urban Design Workshop in conjunction with Friends of the Earth Middle East, traveled to the Jordan-Israel border. On the site of the ruined Rotenberg Hydroelectric Station of the Palestine Electric Company, they collaborated with Jordanian, Israeli, and Palestinian architects on the design the first Peace Park in the Middle East. Two Yale undergraduate filmmakers followed the story with a camera, in an attempt to capture this significant moment and share this unique story with others.”

m3architecture out of Brisbane in association with Brian Hooper Architect designed this lovely Memorial for the Tree of Knowledge in the town of Barcaldine in Queensland, Australia which marks the 1891 founding location of the Australian Labour party. While the design is stunning in it’s simplicity and yet highly textural nature, the most interesting part about this project is that it centers around a dead tree and the building itself, made of wood, is also essentially a dead tree. In this time where designers are trying to find everyway possible to cover things inside and out with living material, it is fascinating to see a “dead” design that is trying to evoke the feeling of the living.

From the architects via Dezeen, “Following the poisoning of the tree in 2006 a memorial was commissioned to commemorate and mark this historical landmark located in the small town of Barcaldine in Queensland, Australia. The design forms an 18 metre high steel and timber structure that follows the canopy, in relief, of the old ghost gum tree using 3,600 individual hanging timber slats. From afar the memorial seems to form a suspended slatted container that surrounds the remaining branches of the original tree; only once visitors stand under the structure they become aware of the canopy that the individual slats form.”

“m3architecture’s, Michael Lavery explains: ‘The design was inspired by the way people create and relive memories. The external timbers are charcoaled to create a veil around the memorial space. This finish and its form reference a place of memory and mourning. The “veil” provides hints to the form and movement inside but it does not fully reveal the impact of this space. This experience is saved for visitors as they enter the shade of the “tree”.’ ”

“Visible from the highway the building also serves as a signpost for the town and acts as a gateway to Barcaldine forming part of the entrance way to the railway station. At night the memorial is illuminated and creates a popular meeting place for social exchange. The original root ball of the tree is preserved and showcased to visitors through a glass floor panel located under the canopy.”

images via dezeen