Each week you can expect to learn What’s New here on Greenroofs.com through our “This Week in Review” video.  Here is the transcript from December 16th and 9th, 2011 from our daughter, Anjuli – click on the photo below to see the video, or here.  Enjoy!

- Hello, I’m Anjuli Velazquez and welcome to This Week in Review for December 16th and 9th, 2011 on GreenroofsTV.

- Projects of the Week

-  Our project of the week is the Orchard Central Mall Greenwalls built in 2009 in Singapore. Orchard Central Mall is Singapore’s tallest and first vertical pure-retail mall, and has a 160m façade featuring a faceted membrane which functions as a massive media wall, adding visual vibrancy to Orchard Road. The rooftop gardens offer a great spot for dining alfresco, sipping coffee, or enjoying afternoon tea, and feature three large living walls, a balcony rail on the 11th floor, and two lower green walls on the 12th floor roof terrace.

Orchard Central Mall is a winner of the Singapore Institute of Architects and National Parks Board Skyrise Greenery Awards in 2009. The award aims to promote skyrise greenery in Singapore and to recognize the greening efforts in high rise developments by owners/developers, architects, landscape architects/designers, and landscape contract managers. VersiCell sub-soil drainage modules were used in the landscaped areas and planter boxes to facilitate efficient drainage of water and the Elmich Green Wall systems were installed on the 11th and 12th floors of the mall.

-  Our project of the week for last week was The Ramona Apartments, in Portland, OR.  The Ramona Apartments is a new mixed-use, midrise apartment building consisting of six stories of wood-framed construction over a concrete podium. In addition to the ecoroof, the building’s courtyard contains permeable surfaces, plants, gravel and sand that are designed to filter and retain stormwater. Together with the roof, these elements treat one hundred percent of the property’s stormwater. Additional benefits of the ecoroof are the mitigation of the urban heat island effect and providing an environment for native habitat.

-  To learn more about the Orchard Central Mall Greenwalls, click on our project of the week photo on our homepage and for The Ramona Apartments, type in Project ID #1384 in the Greenroof & Greenwall Projects Database.

“What’s New”

- Our 2012 Greenroofs & Walls of the World™ 12 Month Wall Calendar is now available for purchase! The Greenroofs & Walls of the World™ series combines two of our most popular destinations on Greenroofs.com: The Greenroof & Greenwall Projects Database and Upcoming Events. It’s a great way to highlight fabulous projects and our website Sponsors, our highest level of advertising. Kudos to all the sustainable designers out there as well as the companies and organizations who back us up with ecologically friendly products and services. You can get the perfect holiday gift for your family, friends, staff and clients for only $12.95 which includes shipping within the U.S, and Canada, or a special discount for orders of 10 or more!

- Every week we’ll be uploading a video from our Greenroofs & Walls of the World™ Virtual Summit 2011 to our greenroofsTV page and YouTube channel. Last week we featured our Opening Keynote Address by Charlie Miller, P.E. of Roofmeadow: “A New Place.” And this week we’re highlighting the “2011 Top 10 Hot Trends in Greenroof & Greenwall Design” by Linda Velazquez and Haven Kiers, so be sure to check them out and stay tuned for more!

Advertiser Press Releases:

-  New Green Building Product Announcement: Introducing LiveRoof® Maxx: the Eight-Inch Deep module for the LiveRoof® Hybrid Green Roof System.

-  Welcome to our new Greenroof Directory advertiser H. Keith Wagner Partnership out of Burlington VT!

Industry News Update

-  The City Planning Commission unveiled a proposal this week to amend New York City’s zoning code to make it easier for buildings to incorporate environmentally friendly additions such as solar panels, wind turbines and wall insulation. The package of rule changes, dubbed Zone Green, would permit solar panels, greenroofs, storm water detention systems, skylights and other green features on buildings, despite height restrictions, and would allow owners to install wind turbines up to 55 feet above rooftops on waterfront buildings and buildings taller than 100 feet.

-  Joblinks Update

Columbia-Green is looking for a Sales Manager based in the Midwest or East Coast, USA.

The Horticultural Society of New York (The Hort) is seeking a Greenroof Research Intern in New York, NY.

-  Over at Sky Gardens, check out Linda’s latest posts: “Greenroofs & Walls of the World™ Virtual Summit 2011 Episode 2: The Hot Top 10 List by Linda Velazquez and Haven Kiers,” “Order Your 2012 Greenroofs & Walls of the World™ Calendar Now!,” “Greenroofs & Walls of the World™ Virtual Summit 2011 Episode 1: Charlie Miller,” and “See all the Greenroofs & Walls of the World™ Virtual Summit 2011 Videos on greenroofs.tv!”

- “Upcoming Events”

-  The Water-Harvesting Certification Training program in Phoenix takes place from February 24th to March 4th, 2012 and applications are due December 30th, 2011.

- “In the News”

-  Matt Hickman of Mother Nature Network blogs about “Evergreen homes: Green Roof House.” In his monthly series of spotlighting green residential building projects from his home state of Washington, Hickman talks about the Green Roof House and says, “When building up to accommodate a growing family, the owners of the Green Roof House not only added a second floor to their Seattle bungalow but neighbor-pleasing elements like a green roof and living wall.”

This House was showcased as part of the 2011 Seattle Green Home Tour and includes numerous green amenities like a solar PV system, a living wall, a rainwater catchment system and a greenroof. Working with a growing family who could only build up and not out, the design-build firm Batt + Lear, went up to the roof to see exactly how a 2nd story would impact the neighbors’ view. Not wanting to make any additional living space unfortunate for the neighbors or clash with the existing architecture, they decided to build the 2nd floor addition on the front half of the home and install the beautiful greenroof on the back half. Now when the neighbors look out their windows, instead of black asphalt to look at, they’ll have a lush colorful landscape.

-  Robin L. Eschler of WomensRadio.com, talks about “Green Roofs and a 300 Year Old Business: An interview with Ed Snodgrass.” Traditional farming, raising corn, cattle, llamas, Christmas trees and now greenroof plants, Emory Knoll Farms has been around for over 300 years. Ed Snodgrass, current Emory Knolls Farm co-owner, international horticulturalist, author and avid conservationist, and contributing editor here at Greenroofs.com, is carrying on the success of the six-generations-family-owned business in northern Maryland.

Today the majority of Emory Knolls Farm is supporting indigenous trees, native meadow plants, native fauna and over ninety species of birds and the nursery is the only one in North America that is dedicated just to greenroof plants. Emory Knoll Farms is currently involved in over 800 projects and has incorporated as a B-Corporation, or Benefit Corporation, and actively uses the principles of the Natural Step process, a set of four principles developed in Sweden for sustainable manufacturing. You can learn more about Ed and Emory Knoll Farms at GreenRoofPlants.com.

To learn more about these stories and new ones posted daily, go to our In the News or newslinks section of our website.

-  Send us your green articles, videos and images to editor@greenroofs.com and share your greenroof or green wall info with the world!

- Make sure to keep up with everything Greenroofs.com by following us on Twitter, liking us on Facebook, being a member of our network on LinkedIn, and subscribing to our greenroofsTV channel on YouTube!

- This has been This Week in Review for December 16th and 9th, 2011 on GreenroofsTV.  I’m Anjuli Velazquez and I’ll see you in a couple weeks with our This Year in Review!

- Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays from all of us here at Greenroofs.com!

*This week’s episode is sponsored by The Greenroof Directory, brought to you by Greenroofs.com.*

Did we miss something?  We’d love to hear from you!

~ Linda V.

Each week you can expect to learn What’s New here on Greenroofs.com through our “This Week in Review” video.  Here’s the transcript from November 11th, 2011 from our daughter, Anjuli – click on the photo below to see the video, or here.  Enjoy!

- Hello, I’m Anjuli Velazquez and welcome to This Week in Review for November 11th on GreenroofsTV.

- Project of the Week

-  Our project of the week is the Master Builders Association Durban, Westville greenroof built in 2010 in Durban, South Africa. The Master Builders Centre was built in 1982 as a commercial building comprising about 3600 square meters of commercial space. Some of the finishes on the building were becoming old and unsightly, also the exhibition space had lost popularity, so it was time re-look at the utilization of this space and introduce new activities that would not only add beauty to the building, but also add energy savings. The greenroof is mainly comprised of indigenous plants, which require minimal water, are able to propagate themselves, and are less susceptible to pest outbreaks and harsh climates. Also, the green roof increases the vegetation on the property, promotes biodiversity and reduces the rate and volume of stormwater discharge. The roof podium area was planted with two separate systems designed by Green Roof Designs cc, one half using recyclable HDPE green roof modules and the other half using treated softwood timber boxes, which were constructed using both local timber source providers and workers from the area.

To learn more about the Master Builders Association Durban, Westville greenroof, click on our project of the week photo on our homepage.

“What’s New”

-  We’d like to welcome Kawasaki Greenhouses, a supplier of plants and pre-vegetated mats in East Moriches, New York as a new Greenroof Directory advertiser.

Advertiser Press Releases:

-  LiveRoof® Hybrid Green Roof System Takes Home a Readers’ Choice Award From Greenbuild.

-  American Hydrotech promotes Kevin Serena to Garden Roof Technical Sales Coordinator.

-  Over at Sky Gardens, check out Linda’s latest posts: “Greenroofs.com’s ‘This Week in Review’ on GreenroofsTV: November 4, 2011,” “This Week in Review” for October 28th, 2011 and our GPW.

- “Upcoming Events”

- We’d like to say Happy Veterans Day to those of you in the United States and Happy Remembrance Day to our Commonwealth and other friends from across the world!

-  This weekend, November 12th-13th: is Green Festival – A Joint project of Global exchange & Green America in San Francisco, CA.

- November 16th: is Vegetative Roofs – Making Buildings Come Alive Seminar, NCBE Construction Training Center, in Santa Rosa, CA. This educational seminar on vegetative building systems as an effective strategy towards meeting green building requirements is presented by Kevin S. Falkerson and Kerrie Lee Cole of SYMBIOS and our own Design Editor, Haven Kiers.

-  November 16th-18th: is Build Boston 2011, Seaport World Trade Center in Boston, MA.

-  And November 18th: is Green Roofs for Healthy Cities Integrated Water Management for Buildings and Sites in Toronto, Canada.

- “In the News”

-  Brian Cross of the Windsor Star, says “U of W building to impress.” The $112 million Centre for Engineering Innovation is pretty impressive already with its greenroof and living wall but Phase 2 will add 75 foot long wood beams in the ceiling of a four-story atrium. The first phase was completed in the summer and has faculty and students working in research labs. The second phase has three art lecture halls, innovative heating and cooling systems and a rooftop that will become “an academic oasis.” The 10,300 sq ft green roof will be used as a park where students and faculty could eat lunch or relax between classes, and also some students will be studying how much water the roof will divert from storm sewers. Mark Beaulieu, a principal from the architectural firm overseeing the project, says, “I think this will be the greatest learning tool on campus…the building itself is Construction 101, 102, and 103. Structural, mechanical, electrical, the pneumatics of a building, it’s all going to be there to see.”

-  Julia Flynn Siler of the Wall Street Journal, talks about “The Green Man Whose Gardens Defy Gravity.” Have you ever wanted to learn more about the personal side of Patrick Blanc, the Internationally-known French botanist and inventor of the vertical garden? Well, Siler has written an article all about him: from how he starts his day, “often with a glass of white wine or champagne,” to other daily activities like experimenting with plants and vertical systems in his home and drawing sketches about whatever project he is currently working on. Right now he is involved with a private San Francisco high school garden, which is his largest garden in the United States, using more than 4,500 plants. Drew School, in the lower Pacific Heights area, has only California native plants in its garden and small orange-red blossoms are starting to peep through the foliage. You can read more about this vertical garden, how “The Green Man” grew up with his love and inspiration of nature, and an exclusive Wall Street Video at the full article online.

Of course, if you attended our inaugural Greenroofs & Walls of the World™ Virtual Summit, you had the opportunity to see a rare 30 minute interview with Patrick by Linda Velazquez.

To learn more about these stories and new ones posted daily, go to our In the News or newslinks section of our website.

-  Send us your green articles, videos and images to editor@greenroofs.com and share your greenroof or green wall info with the world!

- Make sure to keep up with everything Greenroofs.com by following us on Twitter, liking us on Facebook, being a member of our network on LinkedIn, and subscribing to our greenroofsTV channel on YouTube!

- This has been This Week in Review for November 11th, 2011 on GreenroofsTV.  I’m Anjuli Velazquez and I’ll see you next week!

*This week’s episode is sponsored by The Greenroof Directory, brought to you by Greenroofs.com.*

Did we miss something?  We’d love to hear from you!

~ Linda V.

Greenroofs.com has been an exhibitor at the annual Green Roofs for Healthy Cities conference for 8 years in a row now – from the first Greening Rooftops for Sustainable Communities in Chicago in 2003 to this year’s CitiesAlive! Green Roof & Green Wall Conference in beautiful Vancouver, B.C.  And each year we’ve held a drawing for a free Premium Listing in The Greenroof Directory.  How are people eligible?  You just have to come by and visit our Greenroofs.com booth and drop off your business card – super easy!

We are pleased to announce that Anjuli Velazquez, host of our “This Week in Review” video (also our daughter and mother of almost 2-year old Nicholas), pulled out the following company for our FREE one year Premium Listing in The Greenroof Directory, a $599 value:

Congratulations to annette environmental inc.!  Headed up by two very competent and talented individuals who have been working in this industry for a few years now, we learned this is a new venture for them and that the consulting company will have two headquarters – Washington, D.C. and Toronto.  You may remember Sara Loveland, formerly with D.C. Greenworks, and Ashleigh Uiska, formerly with Fishburn Building Sciences Group Inc. (and previously Green Roofs for Healthy Cities).  We expect great things from this pair of strong and lively women!  If you want to learn more about them, please visit The Greenroof Directory in a few days when we’ll have all the information needed to create their full page color brochure.

By the way, if you were a CitiesAlive! conference exhibitor or attendee, we are extending our 20% offer to you until December 17th for any advertising opportunity that we have on Greenroofs.com – visit Advertise for all the options, from being listed in The Greenroof Directory to Banner Advertising to Sponsorship.
 
Look for some upcoming coverage of the CitiesAlive! Green Roof & Green Wall Conference from a contributing editor and guest writer and more…I promise to report on this successful Vancouver, B.C. conference with lots of photos of people and places – after I catch up with the International Skyrise Greenery Conference in Singapore and the WGIN World Green Roof Congress in Mexico City – up next!  Here are some photos of Vancouver for now:

We hope you enjoyed the Green Roofs for Healthy Cities conference, and look forward to seeing you again next year when it will be held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania!

Happy greening ~ Linda V.

Have you seen HGTV’s first season of “The Outdoor Room with Jamie Durie” yet?  It’s really good!  Now based in Los Angeles, Jamie’s an extremely talented, and well-travelled, landscape artist from Down Under and he brings his international wanderings as the basis for his popular, eclectic designs.

Lackluster outdoor spaces are transformed from dysfunctional and boring to flowing and fantastic.  Homeowners share their woes and desires, and host Jamie draws upon a variety of elements for his metamorphoses – previous experiences with the rich and famous; visiting local designers, horticulturalists and gardeners; and referencing both native and exotic landscapes as well as architecturally designed sites.  The result is always a unique outdoor room, or series of rooms, infused with Jamie’s world view on design aesthetics.

A few weeks ago I saw Episode #HORJD-107H called “The Edible Garden” about transforming a quirky, uneven family backyard into an eco-retreat full of ornamental vegetable gardening options plus a variety of adult and children spaces for play and rest.  And what caught my eye was the top-to-bottom living gazebo!

Since the young eco-conscious family of four from Echo Park, CA, enjoys growing their own organic food and already had several productive but awkward raised beds of their own, Jamie wanted the same features, just with different sensibilities.  After saving some of the existing plants, he visited John, a local “edible garden” designer who incorporates A-frames into his creations for his take on structural elements and planting beds.  Jamie also interviewed Miguel Nelson of The SmogShoppe - a former Los Angeles gas emissions station/auto repair shop turned hip eco-event space with 2,000 sf of amazing green walls.

What a cool space!  First of all it’s pending LEED Platinum certification, and the exterior and interior walls are completely covered in lush vegetation, grown in modular “Woolly Pockets.”  I was unfamiliar with this particular system which is made from felt and recycled plastic bottles.
 

Not part of the show, but interesting on its own, I found out that in addition to his commercial enterprise, Miguel started “Woolly School Gardens.”  Through the program, inexpensive gardens are planted at local schools to help teach nutrition and gardening to students K-12.  They say they’re ideal for urban schools as the Woolly Pockets planting system allows them to be created anywhere – from a concrete wall to a chain link fence.  There are numerous Woolly School Gardens in the Los Angeles area and the goal is to have 11,000 by 2011.  For more information, visit www.woollyschoolgarden.org.

Back to the HGTV episode, with the SmogShoppe as his inspiration, Jamie and crew built the open-air structure leaving one expansive wall open.  The living lounge area was easily blanketed on the remaining three sides with Woolly Pockets.  Luscious, edible plants were inserted and it was done.  By the way, these vegetated walls are called “Wallys,” seen below.  Although Jamie doesn’t even mention the greenroof (time editing restrictions?), I checked with the company and half of the roof, indeed, is covered with their modular greenroof system called “Meadows.”

The outdoor structure performs beautifully with double duty as a cool relaxation get away and stunning, productive area for vertical “pocket” gardening.  In the end, the family gets to enjoy their newly redesigned, sustainable back yard while setting a great example for ecologically sensitive living for their kids, who also get to learn about natural composting with an earthy gift from Jamie – a squiggly worm farm!

The full episode used to be online at HGTV, but now you can see the partial episode here, and below from YouTube (the HGTV embedded code isn’t working):

This Edible Garden is well worth watching if you have the chance to catch it with reruns.  Each episode of “The Outdoor Room with Jamie Durie” is brimming with equal parts elegant innovation and international flair, and I’m sure this is just the beginning of educating homeowners and entertaining their audience with examples of these living, touchy, sometimes even woolly, vertical gardening techniques.

~ Linda V.

What an awesome concept the Brooklyn Grange Rooftop Farm project is!  I first heard about this late last year but then about a week ago colleagues Bill Foley and Wendy Wark alerted me again, and so now I finally took action this afternoon by donating $50 to the cause.  Not a lot of money, but enough to show Greenroofs.com’s support for an extremely worthwhile undertaking.

As we all know in this green industry of ours, underutilized rooftop space is one of the greatest real estate potentials for greenroof implementation.  In this age of trying to come together as a community, organic farming, and healthy food plus security issues, what better way to help mitigate the developmental woes of a building’s footprint that planting crops at rooftop level?  And (hopefully) make a profit?

That’s exactly what Brooklyn Grange is doing for their own community – they’re in the process of starting a rooftop farm with a team of five partners and a whole bunch of friends, and the organizer, Ben Flanner says it’s ”A big project that requires a lot of hard work to say the least, and one that sets an example for using under-utilized rooftop space across this dense city to do something productive.  There are many benefits to the city and community from such an operation.”  Most certainly, and we can all help by donating even just $1 – by this Friday, May 28, 2010 – but $10 gets a bee named after you!  Actually, for all donations of $10 or more, they will list you as a donor on their website and name one of their honeybees after you.

They’ve setup a campaign on an interesting new website called kickstarter, which is designed to help raise funds for enterprising people to start new projects – such as this one.  Kickstarter has a unique platform where you set your goal at the onset of the campaign, and then you need to hit that goal from online pledges to receive funding, otherwise all of your pledges are simply returned to the pledgers.  People can click on your project and pledge any amount during the course of the campaign.

So what is the project really all about?  Their page on kickstarter says:

“Brooklyn Grange will be a 1 acre rooftop farm situated in New York City. Such a commercially-viable rooftop farm has yet to be realized in this country. We will use simple greenroof infrastructure to install over 1 million pounds of soil on the roof of an industrial building on which we will grow vegetables nine months of the year. Being in the country’s largest city, the farm will create a new system of providing local communities with access to fresh, seasonal produce. We plan to expand quickly in the first few years, covering multiple acres of New York City’s unused rooftops with vegetables. The business has many environmental and community benefits, and allows our city dwelling customers to know their farmer, learn where their food comes from, and become involved.”

Ironically, as it turns out, Brooklyn Grange’s first project isn’t in Brooklyn but on a 40,000 square foot, 6-story industrial rooftop in Queens!  And the group is very happy to have the good fortune of this company’s backing, too, and they’ll be selling their produce in both boroughs as well, including tomatoes, eggplants, chilies and various leafy greens.  The farm will be run by Ben Flanner, who started and ran a proof of concept rooftop farm in the summer of 2009.  The beyond-organic produce will be sold directly to the community at an onsite stand, affording shoppers a direct relationship with the farm and farmers.  Additional produce will be sold to a small group of market-driven local restaurants.  He explains the business philosophy:

“We are a for-profit business. We believe in adding fiscal sustainability to the sustainability rubric so that urban rooftop farms can expand across the city, the Northeast and even the world! Any profits we make will go towards paying our farmer a living wage and whatever remains will be reinvested in the business so we can keep growing.” ~ Ben Flanner

In what stage is the project now?  In a newsletter today, May 25, 2010, Ben shares that “At this moment, we’ve installed about two-thirds of the rooftop soil, and we have about 110 sacks (~300,000 lbs) to lift yet with the crane, continuing tomorrow morning early.”

Brooklyn Grange needed to hit their goal of $20,000 by Friday, May 28, to get some important funds for the farm through kickstarter, and I’m pleased to report they have!  As of right now, supporters and fans have pledged $20,740.50, but please consider contributing more to their entreprenuerial greening efforts.  To pledge now, visit here, and they’d love it if you would also help spread the word!  Read “High Above Queens, the Dirt Is Deep, and Good” by Diane Cardwell in the New York Times of May 13, 2010, see their profile on kickstarter, and the video below.

For more info, visit Brooklyn Grange’s own website or contact Ben at: ben.flanner@gmail.com or 608.215.0218.

Happy veggie rooftop greening! ~ Linda V.

Season’s greetings to all,

It’s time to reflect on the industry as we find ways to combat the decline of the economy. The green industry has taken center stage and has also become a profitable market for most. Looking back at 2008, personally I have seen more backyard manufacturing of products being labeled green, new DBA’s sprouting green buds of lackluster products, performance and knowledge, making waves in the industry and establishing flags of caution for the experienced and legitimate green business and products.

My point is a word of caution to consumers and designers. It used to be when there were layoffs and an adjustment in the economy, a new lawn cutting or landscaping business would show up, and everyone was a landscaper. These same small landscape companies did not have the experience and overhead that resulted in low ball bids making the Lawn & Garden industry a tough place to make a living - I know, I did it for 23 years.  The good thing is these start-ups are not around long.

Today it’s not the person with a new truck or trailer and a lawn mower; it’s a new “Green Business, Green Business Consultant or a green product”. It’s understandable that we all want to make a living and at this point retain our existing lifestyles or in some cases simply survive. Anyone with a lump of cash or a credit line can manufacture anything. Things to consider when hiring a consultant or thinking about using a new green product:

1. Ask for credentials, experience and portfolio;

2. Request references;

3. Ask to talk to other employees, they can be brutally honest;

4. Request research and long term data;

5. Look for public media, not just press releases;

In our business we have seen consultants and designers that simply do not have practical experience. As forward thinking and positive our industry (green roofs and green walls) is, do your homework when a green project is in your reach. Just because they attended Green Roofs 101, it doesn’t make them a green roof consultant or installer.