Biophilic Design: The Architecture of Life screening in New York, Aug. 4

Take out your calendars, all of those in the New York tri-state area, August 4, Sustainable Long Island is having a film screening of the one hour documentary Biophilic Design: The Architecture of Life. If you're in the area, check it out. Screenings are rare events and it's a fundraiser too!

Singapore's biophilic design

Looking back through my draft box I re-discovered this fantastic film on the biophilic movement in Singapore.

Ice cream trucks, so why not carrots?

The Permaculture Activist,  the 30 year old permaculture journal, has a new Kickstarter campaign to raise their online profile. If you are moved to contribute, check out their page.

-New York's Department of Environmental Protection announced their 2015 green infrastructure winners, over $3 million dollars will be disbursed. What do the winners have in common? Very ambitious (and big) projects, which will be atop everything from parking garages to auto-body shops turned halal slaughterhouses.   

-“It’s kind of strange - we’ll let ice cream trucks roll down the street and sell all kinds of sugary things, but you can’t sell a carrot.” This kind of quote, one would guess, would be attributed to a local, urban agriculture activist. But this is actually Dallas' sustainability coordinator talking and you can bet the Big D is up for some changes.
Hmmm...but what if you combined those two...carrot ice cream? Would everyone be happy???

-Patented in Lebanon and debuted in Cairo, have a gander at this very artistic green wall, inside Cairo’s Galleria mall. That's two big GILA projects for Cairo, in the last 3 months!

Featured green roof project - Woodsworth Co-op

This week we'll be installing a green roof on top of Toronto's Woodsworth Coop. The man behind the name led a very interesting life. If you're in the St. Lawrence Market area and have never seen a green roof installation before, come on down and have a look from the park across the street.  
Here's our canvas:

Dropping by Seneca College for a living architecture talk

Tomorrow I'll be the closing speaker for Seneca College's Green Citizen Conference. The topic, living architecture of course!

-And I'll give you some advanced notice so you can prepare, Friday don't forget to celebrate National Pumpkin Day!

You know urban agriculture has hit the big time when...

-Fayvetteville, Arkansas begins developing an urban agricultural plan. Fayvetteville, Arkansas!!!

-In honor of Food Day on October 24 the Huffington Post (really?) showcased 25 unique urban agriculture individuals and programs.

 -I find it terribly interesting how urban agriculture programs, sometimes with and sometimes without an aquaponics program, seem to be proliferating around North America. Programs at community or technical colleges? Not really. And I am wondering why that is. Seems like a perfect research opportunity whether you are interested in the technical aspects or supplying fresh food to your student body or local community. With so many different kinds of aquaponics set-ups to choose from, there's no need not to do it.
Speaking of aquaponics, I can forget these two recent, groundbreaking projects in The Cook Islands and in Gaza City. Especially Gaza City, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization has set up an amazing project.

-This next article points to a key feature of urban agriculture which is rarely highlighted, but terribly important as more cities encourage urban agriculture: plants keep cities cool!

-If you want a sneak peak at some big living architecture projects in 2013 and 2014 check out NY Magazine, pages 2-4 and 8 will blow your mind!

-Conference alert! The Bioneers regional conferences have just kicked off. Focusing on topics of urban restoration, bio-cultural diversity, youth leadership and more, the 24 regional conferences will wrap up in late January.

Can a mighty green roof be your city's silver bullet solution?

The Highline, everyone's favorite green infrastructure project, has done big things for New York City. Nearly every week I read an article analyzing how transformational it really is and the many ways to view its success.  This particular author proclaims that it's a poster child for adaptive reuse, and gives us a few other iconic projects.
Rod Stevens wrote a piece last year about "silver bullet solutions" for municipal redevelopment and revitalization; it was one of my favorite articles of the year and features my favorite graphic as well. We need an updated graphic and "Building a Highline" added to the #32 slot. Well, maybe #35 (downtown pedestrian malls and downtown areas were added by some readers after the original article). In colorful detail the graphic boils down all the things cities have tried. I always forget to share this, enjoy!