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| Photo by Glenda Sinks One Central Park Building—Sydney, Australia |
What a spectacular building! In fact, it is so spectacular that it received the award for Best Tall Building in the World in 2014. The construction began on it in 2007 and was completed in 2013. Now, ten years later the green wall concept is still going strong and is growing more important as the effects of climate change continue to take its toll. As you can imagine, this multi-use building (offices, apartments, & a hotel) does not reflect as much heat as non-green wall buildings.
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| One Central Park, by ASPECT | OCULUS. Photo credit: Simon Wood |
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| One Central Park, by ASPECT | OCULUS. Photo credit: Simon Wood |
For those who want scientific analysis to back up the benefit of green walls, the first source listed below is quite a scholarly review which will give more data. This blog is simply bringing the concept of green walls to your attention since we don’t see them often in Colorado.
The main elements of green walls are the following:
1. Plants: A variety of plants can be used— self-clinging climbers to those needing supports; deciduous plants to vegetables grown for food. Native Australian plants are used on the Sydney building.
2. Plant medium: The building in Sydney uses hydroponics as the plant medium; no soil is used.
3. Structures that support the plants: The architect and the botanist of One Central Park used a felt-covered frame which is attached to the structure to support the plants. Planter boxes are also used on green walls.
4. Irrigation: This building uses a hydroponic system with recycled water. This grey water is also used inside the building for non-potable purposes.
Sources listed below detail more features of the building in Sydney such as the cantilever reflecting mirrors (not pictured in my photo) which can redirect the sunlight throughout the day. In addition, LED lighting illuminates the building at night.
Living architecture is becoming more prominent in big cities around the world. Of course, cold Colorado winters are deadly to many outside plants, but maybe one day a cost-effective solution will be designed which will protect green walls on high-rises in Denver in the winter. I would love to see green walls on high-rises, but for now we may just have to be content with green walls on the inside of buildings. That is the makings of another blog which someone else might want to tackle.
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