A touch of colour for the weekend!

After what seems a very long dark winter, spring is finally on it’s way and the first bulbs are coming through. Start your new garden season with a touch of colour and have a good weekend!!

 

We love the flower pavillon made of steel and bamboo from Archipelontwerpers for the International Horticultural Exposition 2011 in Xi’an

The pavilion merges technological and organical design into one. The overall design refers to a most important part of sustainability, namely production processes. This design shows that one can create diversity within a typical production process and thus create mass customization. Diversity is sustainability. This will be the upcoming challenge in regard to the mssive growth within Chinese cities. It will prove to be immensely sustainable to offer flexibility in productional processes in relation to housing solutions. The flowerpavilion, located at the shore has been designed through an algoritmic morph. For this Archipelontwerpers have used the city outline of Xi’An and the outline of Holland to create the shape of the pavilion. It symbolises the meeting and exchange between two cultures.
The pavilion refers also to an artificial calyx. This reference also emphasizes the fusion between design and IT in contemporary design. Most importantly, the pavilion appears as a flower, hence the name flower pavilion, and that is what Holland is most famous for. 

8 is a container gardening kit which takes a holistic approach to container gardening. 8 growers receive all the tools and resources–both modern and rustic–that they need to be successful gardeners. Along with gardening supplies, the kit contains an iPhone app, cookbook, dinner invitations, and a social networking site, and more. By shifting container gardening from a hobby to a lifestyle, 8 makes gardening a celebration of friends, family, and nature. 8, drink, and be merry.

Website: jderksen.com 

This enclosed back garden uses tree ferns to create a dramatic year-round effect. The levels steps up gradually from a cast concrete terrace to a small sandpit and kids garden at the far end of the garden. The journey between the two is through a mass of delicate grasses and lumpy mounds of box.

Photos by Marianne Majerus / Kurosh Davis

Spring is on it’s way! H&M; presents its spring collection 2011 with two thematic collections. We are loving the ‘Raw Nostalgia’ collection – pillow cases, tea towels and bed linens with a vegetal vintage look….

Another great garden of last years RHS Chelsea Flower Show.

Inspired by travel, this contemporary gravel garden brings together flavours of the Southern Cape, the maquis shrubland of the Mediterranean, the chaparral of California and Mexico and the matorral of central Chile. Corten steel screens slice through the design, fusing architectural and sculptural qualities to define spaces and control views within the garden. Open clearings of sparsely planted gravel provide places to pause on a journey that culminates in a courtyard at the rear, where the shade of a stately cork oak and the sound of running water combine to create a contemplative retreat.

Find more of Andy Sturgeon’s projects here: http://www.andysturgeon.com

 

Find more of Andy Sturgeon’s projects here: http://www.andysturgeon.com/

‘Nomadisch Grün’ has launched ‘Prinzessinnengärten’ as a pilot project in summer 2009 at Moritzplatz in Berlin Kreuzberg, a site which has been wasteland for over half a century. Along with friends, fans, activists and neighbours, the group cleared away rubbish, installed transportable vegetable pots and reaped the first fruits of their new urban garden.

Hope other cities will follow this trend of urban farming….

Today we love the vertical garden for the head office of Crédit du Nord.

You can find more of Patrick Blanc’s work here:

http://www.verticalgardenpatrickblanc.com

Thank you all for your great responses by email! This motivates to proceed blogging despite having a desk full of unfinished projects… Have a quick look at the outdoor collection ‘Acqua’ by Italian designer Paola Lenti:

Let’s start with our favorite garden from 2010: The Laurent Perrier Garden at the RHS Chelsea flower show designed by Tom Stuart-Smith.

A modern garden of subtle and varying textures: the centrepiece is an elegant, bronze Pavilion designed by award winning architect Jamie Fobert. 

The Pavilion is a sophisticated sculpture constructed from folded sheets of patinated copper.  Overlooking an elongated pool of water and Spring woodland planting, the sculpture contrasts with the purity and naturalism around it.

A rectilinear pattern of paths guides the viewer through the curve of the trees, providing a private route through the garden. The stones are laid precisely giving a very crisp finish, creating order within nature.

A natural stone provides a rich textured wall around the garden and smaller, curvier paths through the planting, contrasting with the smooth bronze and paving and breaking up the formality of the garden.

The planting itself consists of three separate elements: a grove of Betula, River Birch – an attractive copper bark which peels off in sheets and reflects the colour of the Pavilion and walls, two hedges of cloud pruned Box which encloses the garden further, and woodland planting.  The planting is based on a woodland flora, dominated by fresh white flowers, woodland grasses, Euphorbias and Blue Iris Siberica, which contrast to the strength and darkness of the bronze.
 
Italian designer Luciano Giubbilei, known for his sharp, minmalist style, will be at Chelsea this year, designing a garden for Laurent-Perrier. As soon as we have some artist’s impressions, we will load them on to the blog. But you can guarantee that Luciano’s garden will be stylish, contemporary and beautiful.

Studio botaniq is a small garden design and landscape architecture office based in the Netherlands. We have created this blog so that we can share what we’re currently obsessing over… 

Hope you like it ♥