Healthy Home: How to Go Green With a Living Wall or Roof
See 10 ways to add this earth-friendly element to your home
Jess McBride
August 25, 2016
Houzz Contributor. Custom decorating professional and content creator for the home design industry with a lifelong passion for color, pattern, and texture of every "stripe"
Houzz Contributor. Custom decorating professional and content creator for the home... More
Living walls and roofs are probably the first things that come to mind when a newcomer to the biophilic design approach attempts to wrap his or her head around the term. While plants are by no means the only, or even the best, way to express a naturalistic inclination in our homes, they deserve a special place in any environmentally minded home. Of the many trends that suggest that a major cultural shift toward biophilic design is on the horizon, living walls and green roofs are the most striking. It’s hard not to feel invigorated in a sea of green.
1. Exterior ecosystem. We’ll start with a biggie: An entire exterior clad with plants can attract bees, insects and birds, creating a mini ecosystem to replace the one that was lost to the building’s foundation. It’s obviously best to design a new build to minimize the effect on the ecosystem. But planting a living wall can be a great way to upgrade an existing structure as an alternative to demolishing it or trucking in new materials to make it pretty again. When debating sustainable, biophilic strategies, always err on the side of leaving the fewest scars on the earth.
2. Rooftop rainforest. Making use of so much surface area for a rooftop garden makes intuitive sense, especially for homeowners who want to make their home greener but don’t get enough sunlight to justify installing solar panels. Living roofs offer a variety of benefits, such as ecosystem regeneration and natural temperature regulation. They require extra thought and planning to ensure that the weight of the soil is adequately supported, but the physical and emotional rewards can be well worth it.
3. Green garage. Green walls makes an inspired addition to a garage, that big hulking box we’d usually rather hide or disguise. With a plant wall, there’s no need — the garage becomes something to celebrate.
4. Wonder wall. Walls, like garages, aren’t always the most attractive and inviting structures, but with a little imagination, they can become living sculptures. Try playing with different plant species to create a striated pattern on the wall, emphasizing height and verticality.
5. Renewed rec room. As with everything in decorating and in life, a little can go a long way. Just as you might pick up the pattern or color of your draperies in a coordinating pillow, plant life has been carried from the wall to the table in this billiard lounge. Both stand out in glorious contrast to the sea of studied neutrals.
6. Green-topped wall. With a little bit of sunlight, climbing vines can make your living room feel as though it’s been colonized by nature. An entire wall is possible but not necessary; accenting the top with vines will have the same majestic effect of a secret garden overflowing a retaining wall. But choose your vine well and consider supporting it on a trellis — some vines can damage walls to which they cling.
Care and Training for a Vine-Covered Home
Care and Training for a Vine-Covered Home
7. Stylishly spare. A living wall doesn’t have to be lush and chock-full of plants. Vines look just as swell in sparse wisps. Yes, this counts as a living wall!
8. Bucket list. This wall of bucket planters also counts as a living wall. A setup like this allows for experimentation, as different plant species can be tested out here and moved into the garden if they don’t thrive indoors. Empty spots look like part of the design rather than a result of indecision or poor plant tending. These planters would also be a terrific venue for a kitchen herb garden.
9. Natural art. San Francisco designer Lindy Donnelly used two plant-filled frames in lieu of artwork over the nightstands here. This is a great solution when you have wall space you’d like to decorate but don’t want the specificity of artwork. Plants always read as an eclectic neutral.
10. Hallway hothouse. A green wall is an absolute home run for a hallway opposite large glass windows, doors or skylights. Situating your green wall to maximize sunlight is key.
More Healthy Home: Sunrooms and Conservatories | Courtyards Bring Light and Life Indoors
More Healthy Home: Sunrooms and Conservatories | Courtyards Bring Light and Life Indoors
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how do you make the indoor plant frames?
jodidave1, there is more than one way to make an indoor frame for a green wall. They all require certain things, though: a waterproof back, sides and bottom; something to hold the soil in place; a catchment for excess water. They might also contain a pump to transfer water from the catchment to the top of the construction.
The waterproofing can be thick plastic or an epoxy coating, but all wood should be protected from contact with the potting medium. The easiest thing to hold the medium in place at the front is landscape fabric with slits cut to place plants. Poultry wire can also be used with coarse sphagnum placed against the inside, and potting medium added behind. A plastic container that completely covers the bottom, and filled with an aquarium type carbon should catch extra water, but there's no guarantee against overflows.
Once the frame is completed, fill it with potting medium, tamping it down, then watering to settle it further. Even with this step it's possible for the medium to continue to settle over time. Allow the medium to dry for several days, then cut slits and add plants. Below is an exploded side view of construction, along with a front view of a completed project.
DIYers often use pallets to construct similar green wall frames. HERE is a link with pictures.
very helpful- thank you