One of the biggest downfalls for sketch-up is the inability to produce presentable work because of its extremely cartoon-like graphics. About two years ago I was introduced to Podium, a rendering engine plug-in for sketch up that is extremely easy to use while also allowing  for a great deal of customization.

Podium originally focused on interior renderings, creating extremely realistic images for interior architecture scenes. The rendering engine now handles outdoor scenes very well and allows for presentable images.

There is a very short learning curve when it comes to playing with shadows and light. The key features that come in to play in creating your own style come with the ability to create your own textures and properly applying reflections, transparencies, and exposure.  Like any digital scene, applying some Photoshop skills to post-rendered images makes a world of a difference. While Podium allows you to use and render vegetation, after doing that for some of my renderings I would highly recommend that you add your trees and people in photoshop.

While there is a free download for this, it does not allow you to export high resolution images. Unfortunately, the cost for the application is around $100 for the student version. I recommend you check out their website at www.suplugins.com to see some of their examples and tutorials to see if this is for you. I highly recommend it as all of my base images are rendered through Podium first.

For those not interested in spending money while still producing high resolution renderings. There is a rendering plug-in called Kerkythea that is free to use. However, this rendering engine is a lot more technical with a much higher learning curve. It is extremely open to customization and if you learn how to use it correctly, it will produce great renderings.

Below are examples of Podium renderings I have done in the past. These are a combination of sketchup/podium with photoshop. If you have any questions about the application feel free to post them on this article or send us an e-mail through the Contact link on the top Menu.

The realization of imminent changes to the way we obtain resources is a topic that many within the design realm continue to ignore as a whole. Focused attempts at recycling energy, water, and other resources are fantastic and should continue, however, these attempts do not curb the reality that the city, including the suburbs, still works like a parasite, not an ecosystem. A city will never work as such until the number one rule of an ecosystem is addressed: The food source must be a cycle from within.

The concept of agriculture fused within urban territory is nothing new but thankfully it is a topic that is now greatly debated and analyzed. Many of the proposals out there involve agriculture at an individual and community based scale, while some are starting to look at new holistic approaches to agriculture within the city. I offer my findings and opinions on agriculture + urbanism as my research and interest in the subject grows.  The snippets below offer a glimpse of some contemporary trends but I highly suggest that any interested citizen, designer, or reader goes further to find more resources.  Case studies, books, articles, and projects can now be found everywhere on this subject and it is necessary to synthesize all the information one finds to understand where urban agriculture is heading.
As a starter I highly recommend the sources listed at the end of this article.

Urban Agriculture Today: Today’s response to individual and community needs.

Like stated early, urban agriculture has been part of the city for a long time. However, over the last decade it has flourished in to a multi-faceted option for urbanism. The general move towards sustainability, natural systems, and maybe an overall suspicion of what is in our food has led to a slight demand for fresh, natural, and non-supermarket supply of food. Urban agriculture can be found in all scales and types through out cities, suburbs, and anything in between in the form of  a small front-yard garden for herbs or a fairly large production roof-top greenhouse. However, urban agriculture has really taken off within the realm of community building. As this type of agriculture is reduced back to small scale hand labor it creates an excellent opportunity for education on growing, preserving and preparing. This can be tied with many sorts of social functions such as community building, schooling, therapy, recreation and not to mention natural infrastructure for storm water management, open space, composting, and biodiversity.

The most recent push for urban agriculture has come about through the downfall of many cities such as Cleveland, Detroit, New Orleans and many others that have been encompassed in the sphere of “shrinking cities”. In cities where decline of  industry or processes over time has left  a mass of vacant land,  what was considered a hindrance is now seen as a great opportunity for urban agriculture as a way to stitch those areas back together.
Excellent examples of this are happening in Flint, Michigan,  Cleveland, Ohio and more recently in New Orleans as described in our recent article.
The opportunities for individually/community based urban agriculture are expanding and many cities are creating zoning and land use changes to allow for this. A criticism of this practice is that it will never amount to a self-sustaining way of food production. Many of the current precedents do not produce a high enough yield of calories for individuals let alone a community or city. In terms of economics, until the price to ship is no longer considered acceptable and fresh becomes a social requirement, urban agriculture will not have the backing to take off like it should.

Agri-burbia: A great alternative to sprawl, except it is still sprawl.

In February 2011, LAM released an article called “Eat Your Subdivision” which focuses on the proposal of ag-based communities as an alternative for those who seek the agricultural lifestyle in conjunction varying density or those who have concerns about the sustainability of an industrialized agricultural market.  Before the 2008 housing bust, many of these communities were in the works and a couple have been around (in a somewhat different manner) since the 70′s. These communities try to mend the schism between agriculture and development by focusing on the production of necessary agriculture to feed an entire community. The most common models consist of greenfield projects injected with a TND development while leaving most of the acreage for conservation and agriculture.  These developments try to separate themselves from standard subdivisions and TND’s by evoking the message, “live, work, play, AND eat”, while also offering an incentive for the community and involved stakeholders not found in the stand community: revenue from the land (as well as the possibility of subsidies and tax exemptions).

The most recent published attempts at an agricultural community focus a lot more on production of food. One is based on a greater fusion of development and agriculture and the other on exact metrics of production to feed a community.

The first is called Agrarian Urbanism and comes from DuanyPlater-Zyberk. Naturally, the proposal takes the New Urbanist transect and overlays it with agricultural production as a constant element. The aim in this scheme is for an entire community to be part of production whether or not it is high or low yield. Duany insists that that focus is now the front garden not the front porch, and the market square not the retail square. (Which begs the question where is the balance between a retail and civic square create community in a non-agricultural neighborhood?)

The second is termed Agri-burbia focusing mainly on production comes from Quint Redmond’s firm out of Colorado, TSR group.  The proposal is detailed about caloric yield, emphasizes employment and the creation of income. The majority of the land would be dedicated to commercial agriculture while individual lots can be “steward farms”.  His proposal takes a current agricultural area of 522 acres, which produces lower caloric yields and $300,000 annual gross, and inserts 994 dwelling nits, 135 acres of parks and preservation, and 294 acres of agriculture to produce foods of higher caloric yields and an estimated annual gross of $2 million. The efficiency comes from the focus on how and when crops are grown.

In short, the concept of these communities offers a great alternative to the current subdivision and could be very effective today. However, like most subdivisions and CNU projects, they only come about through greenfield sites which bring about all the other issues of resources, economy, and sociology that come with that.

Vertical Agriculture: Possibility of feeding cities in a dense manner with less resources? 

The concept of vertical agriculture almost seems far fetched and many do not believe it will take off. However, you can find the same pattern of information relating to energy efficient, sustainable buildings 20 years ago.  Vertical agriculture is the hydroponic production of food within structures  theoretically allowing for food to be grown in any city on any continent. When you look at the state of natural resources in the world today and the trend of growth, the argument is there. With the current rate of urbanism, how will cities obtain their food when transportation costs are at ridiculous rates? When they can no longer maintain the infrastructure to support agriculture on their peripheries? When water is finally recognized as an extremely precious resource? And, to think big picture, how will societies grow crops if environmental processes create a dramatic shift in temperature and land?

Standard agricultural practice is embedded within the human race as a foundation of its civilizations. However, the practice of it is no longer in line with our roots and future needs. In short, the amount of land, oil (machines, fertilizer, transportation, preservation),  and water needed for standard production is no longer sustainable and also climate based. Established forms of vertical agriculture such as something called a “hydrostacker” allows a farmer to produce 30 acres worth of strawberries on 1 acre of land with 1/10 of the water. The proposal of large scale urban agriculture establishes that a 30 story building on around 5 acres of property can feed roughly 50,000 people a year. This is all done using 1/20th of the water of standard production, no pesticides, no fertilizers, with no agricultural run-off, no soil degradation, and the ability to produce year round. As a visionary idea, it is beautiful to think that someone living in New York city can go to a grocer and buy produce that is less than a day, maybe even a couple hours old.  The technology and structural design for this is available but  no one seems to be rushing to expand upon vertical agriculture as the cost to make such a building doesn’t come close to out weighing the cost of standard agricultural practice. Vertical agriculture will never abolish soil based agriculture, as soil is the seasoning for distinct produce, however, when it comes to a future outlook and the needs to feed masses fresh, healthy, sustainable food, this is a very exciting idea.  There are many questions to be answered and my hopes are that future research for this is encouraging as it offers a great solution for urban agriculture’s full integration in to the city.

Sources:
LAM, Eat Your Subdivision: http://archives.asla.org/lamag/lam11/february/feature1.html
Agricultural Urbanism: http://www.lindroth.cc/pdf/QuickReadAgf.pdf
Public Produce (Nordahl)
Agricultural Urbanism: A handbook for Building Sustainable Food & Agriculture Systems in 21st Century Cities ( Salle & Holland)
The Vertical Farm: Feeding the World in the 21st Century (Despommier)

Images Via:
panacea-bocaf.org
landscapeandurbanism.blogspot.com
shiftcsu.wordpress.com
metropolismag.com

Let us abandon simplicity and give unity its due.’ – Ian McHarg 1969

This post is part book review and part reflection on the ecology of design and sustainability. It begins with a tour of an organic farm in north Florida and closes with one chapter of Simon Swaffield’s reader Theory in Landscape Architecture.

***This is a reissue of a post from earlier last year due to some website reformatting. Enjoy***

Little Organic

Swallowtail Farms is a north Florida CSA organic farm that serves the Gainesville area. CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) is a program that provides fruit and produce to local communities for an upfront yearly fee. This affords sub/urban areas lacking time or space to receive seasonal produce at a reasonable organic price. I worked and toured the farm one Saturday morning with managers Noah Shitama and Zack McLean. The farm’s produce, cut flowers, and eventually livestock are specifically chosen by the CSA member. They operate on biodynamic and site specific principles by cultivating soil, using native resources, and interplanting companion plants. These practices remove the need for fertilizers, herbicides, and fungicides of any sort. This is ultimately better for the food and the people who eat it, but most noticeable to me, better for the landscape. Organic farming offers an alternative to monotypical crop rows and subsidized food and elevates ecology while keeping with the vernacular. Produce lists, pricing and general farm info can be found on their website here.

At the end of my day, I can best describe the 1 year old Swallowtail Farms as trials and tribulations with perpetual smiles. Isn’t that what you really want from your food? Someone who loves their living product, who’s only assistance is from the earth herself, not the chemical company down the road.

An Ecological Approach

So… is organic farming a practical example of a sustainably man-aged landscape? This idea is resurfaced with my reading of Alan Ruff’s An Ecological Approach in Theory of Landscape Architecture inside Swaffield’s reader.  He notes how we overlook the need for healthy landscapes and how practitioners must actively design our world as visual indicators of health, not just functioning symbols of it. If we can use the symbolism of landscapes to sell homes, milk, cars, etc. then we can express and promote sustainable relationships between ourselves and the environment.

Unbeknownst to Swallowtail farms, Ruff’s seven components of an ecologically inspired landscape fall in line with their style of farming.

1. Working with Nature – Take biological factors and let them determine the design while keeping artificial details limited.
2. Enrichment through complexity – Not just diversity of life – planning and designing niches in microenvironments create stability.
3. Landscapes as a process – Designs should grow through succession and design should evolve like great gothic cathedrals
4. Creativity on site – Since the site gives clues to product design, the designer gains inspiration from hands on development and direct contact with the earth.
5. Involvement of users – The absence of a fixed plan involves public discussion and can evolve to suit future needs. The LA needs not be all knowing, but a catalyst.
6. Minimal energy consumption – Use local materials and maintain sites waste. Maintenance should decrease with time and eventually be productive landscapes themselves. Returning our investment.
7. Nature in your front door – With natural management, parks and recreation land use can be reduced.
8. A Need for Conspicuous Sustainability

Filled with haute design vocabulary, part five of the reading focuses on ecological design and highlights the discipline’s emerging focus on ecology and sustainability. As a whole, the authors exposes the difficulties of portraying ecologically functional landscapes to a public that has been oversaturated with detrimentally beautiful spaces. Each of the authors introduced by Swaffield stress that success is found in the smaller sustainable victories and new approaches of management must be integrated into design.

John T. Lyle is a second generation Ian McHarg who’s Design for Human Ecosystems urges that natural processes should be the underlying context for inspiration and planning. Floating seeds cannot create deep forms, deep forms come from the inner workings of landscape and should be visible and seen as meaning.

Robert Thayer’s Gray World, Green Heart has been a staple in green design since 1994.  His focus is on the two relationships that are explored in great depth: Tranparency/Opacity and Nature/Technology.

1. He describes societies current perception as fact, ‘ Opacity and fakery in the landscape only serve to perpetuate the unsustainable status quo…’  By making sustainable forms conspicuous and without transparency, acceptance into society can grow with time.
2. Perceptually, technology is making the world a pleasant place. Practically it is worsening our relationship with the environment and pillaging resources. It also has created a fantasy world of excess and extreme and isolates humans from nature.
3. Here’s a great link from Harvard Design Magazine critiquing and updating Thayer’s sustainability into the 2000’s.
4. Joan Iverson Nausser takes the aforementioned theories and asks Why? Why do we design and manage landscapes the way we do? From Messy Ecosystems, Orderly Frames she explains that humanized landscapes are communication symbols of culture and status. People are constantly seeking information about each other, even through their front yards. This embellishes human traits of neatness and order onto the natural world. Sustainable changes must start by engraining society with a compromise between a messy nature and the human order.

It’s easy to agree with these concepts and theories. Unfortunately, agreeing isn’t enough and action must be taken. The steps were laid over 50 years ago and ecological tolerance is in sight. The media worships green ideology and transparency may be the buzzword of the political year.  Although public opinion is changing, or at least aimlessly walking in that direction, there are decades before acceptance is universal.  LEED doles out points for billion dollar construction and electrical companies are exploring cleaner options. That’s fine and dandy, but light must be shined on smaller aspects of sustainability like food consumption, planting design, maintenance requirements and soil health.

As future professionals, landscape architecture students must find their own balance of ecology and design.

Your approach may not be as draconian as the guidelines of environmentalists or even the authors ascribed here. But hopefully you’ll stop and think occasionally during design development and remember that every move of your sign pen, Staedler, Micron, or marker has momentous consequences for the life below and the success above your project. Believe it or not we truly are changing the world.

ArquitectonicaGEO, the integral landscape architecture division of Miami’s longtime architecture firm Arquitectonica, has designed the ecologically motivated outdoor spaces for the new Miami Science Museum located along Downtown Miami’s waterfront. The new museum is part of Miami’s vision to focus energy along their once overlooked downtown water’s edge. It will be located inside Museum Park adjacent to the new Miami Art Museum, all currently under construction and to be completed by 2015. The museum has incorporated a green roof, storm water rain garden, and food forest that will let the “living” landscape begin the teaching experience even before the user enters the state of the art museum.

STORM WATER GARDEN

The half-acre rain garden fronting Miami’s notable Biscayne Boulevard will collect storm water run-off from adjacent streets, filtering it through the natural and native planted urban ecosystem. When the rain garden reaches its peak “flooded” capability, it can house 7,000 cubic feet of water while the associated cistern can accommodate up to 25,000 gallons of run-off water.  Irrigation and potable water for the site is greatly reduced by the storm water cistern and native plant material, continuing the environmental and educational mission of the museum

“PALM”-ETUM   [NATIVE PALM ARBORETUM]

A native palm arboretum will showcase examples of Florida’s native palm species. Patrons will be allowed to be to walk at ground level to experience the height of mature Royal and Cabbage Palms or study less familiar species such as the keys thatch palm.

FOOD FOREST

“Food Forests” on the site’s green roof and in raised planter beds at ground level, will house self-renewing, self-fertilizing and soil enhancing food production plots. These plots will construct the many layers of a permaculture diagram, from large fruit and nut trees to small root vegetables.

Images: Arquitectonica GEO

Visited the ASLA greenroof on Friday. For all the pomp and circumstance that people have made about it, my visit was honestly quite an underwhelming experience. I missed my Metro stop because I was doing a crossword and ended up in Chinatown about a block away from ASLA. So I thought, “Hey, I should check out the greenroof, I’ve been meaning to do that.” The office is small and unassuming when I approached it and I was met by a seemingly perturbed receptionist who may or may not have thought it was ridiculous that I should bother her for a tour at 8:45 in the morning.