Manifest
The ancient technique of forest gardening describes vertically layering plant species to attain plentiful yields of food from small spaces, with little maintenance. By merging this concept with modern technologies such as drip nutrient delivery systems, artificial climate control, and synthetically induced budding seasons, a greenhouse can conceivably contain a wide variety of productive plants with multiple annual yields.
The result will be a dense, 3-dimensional array of fruit, nut and vegetable bearing plants organized by intrinsic traits such as allelopathic cooperation and gestation period, along with physical characteristics like size, growth behaviour and required sunlight.
The result will be a dense, 3-dimensional array of fruit, nut and vegetable bearing plants organized by intrinsic traits such as allelopathic cooperation and gestation period, along with physical characteristics like size, growth behaviour and required sunlight.
For example an ordinary outdoor dwarf apple tree bears 100 kg of fruit annually within a volume of approximately 100 m³. If 20 m² of kale were planted under the tree the yield would be 40 kg over four months. Four additional cucumber plants climbing the tree could yield 45 kg. By inducing at least two extra budding phases indoors the total yield for this sample ecotone would be upwards of 555 kg/m³. This compares favourably with a greenhouse kale crop on the same area that would yield only 13.5 kg/m².
When mother nature designed the seed of the xanthium she covered it with dozens of spiny hooks that stick to not only fur and clothing, but can also spontaneously agglomerate with each other. By analyzing this self-assembling behavior we discovered that a wireframe of the classic Euclidean icosahedron can display similar properties due to the high probability for interaction and connection.
When hundreds of these regular geometric modules are combined the result is a spontaneous, dynamic, and potentially infinite megastructure. Each unit has approximately 1m3 of volume to provide a home for the cultivation of a wide variety of climate appropriate plants.
These plants will be arranged vertically according to light and temperature requirements, while the horizontal deployment will be determined by access along a predefined circulation route for human interventions including harvesting and maintenance.
The icosahedron module serves many purposes including structural framing, spatial enclosure, support for plants (both climbers and terrestrial), and even rain water storage. Each of the 32 tubes that define the structure of every icosahedron consists of a perforated fiberglass shell and a high-density spongy interior that will absorb rainwater and slowly release it to keep the plants constantly hydrated. The plants themselves are rooted in growing medium contained in a stretchy fabric plane integrated into a defined percentage of the modules. The environment that these icosahedrons create is essentially an artificial food producing rainforest.
