A Few More Fence Ideas

The top design is using microscopic images of pollen, which show various methods of protection. The bottom fence is using the dna double helix, the dna structure will probably be made from rebar and then we will choose various laser cut shapes of natural defence systems to go along its length.

Insects Hotels, Motels, Holiday Inns

Insect Hotels

These are some of the ideas we have developed for insect hotels in Gordon St. As the area has a storm drain running through the middle, it seems appropriate to use some concrete pipes. We are still working on various size options, the square culverts and large round pipes look good, but they will take a lot of filling with insect friendly materials. One option is to get lots of hollow bamboo pieces to fill them, they would look great but take a lot of work to complete, it may be a case of experimenting to see how it works. We shall try out various other materials and monitor which insects like what material best.

The square culverts are used round here for cattle underpasses, amongst other things, but maybe a little on the expensive side, unless we can find some old ones somewhere? One set on the photo are actually a Donald Judd sculpture, not concrete culverts, but no doubt they would be even more expensive.

Fence Protection

Continuing the theme of looking at the natural world and deriving ideas from it to inform our designs for Gordon St. We are looking at using a DNA structure to act as protection for the fences along one side of the space. This will act as both protection and over time, when the planting is in place, as a support for the plants. It also fits in with the students developing the playground area, as they are planning a dna structure. It is also possible that we can follow on the dna structure on the fences to flow into a dna bridge across the storm drain. You can never have enough dna!

The photo is just a first attempt to visualise what it might look like. I am looking at the structure being made of rebar, and being a bit rougher than design in the photo, and costs permitting or at a later stage adding various laser cut shapes to the structure. These would represent various natural forms of defence that we have looked at during the project.

Community Expo

Last Saturday Dargaville had its Christmas Parade and Community Expo. I had a small display showing the High School students work. These photos were before people arrived, I had some good comments from people and suggestions for protecting the fences from graffiti. One was to camouflage the fences, which is something some of the students also looked at.

Vertical Gardens Update

I have just tided up the vertical gardens and over the summer test out some other plants and herbs. As we are in the middle of a drought at the moment, the vertical gardens come into their own, with the salad crops. Though I am topping up the water supply with approximately 10 litres of water per day and we have just had the water tank filled with 20,000 litres, so hopefully we will make through the summer. The gasses will need to be planted somewhere else as they have out grown the garden.

Having a test garden has been useful to work out how such a garden might work in a public space, an one mostly unattended. The initial idea was to provide the community with a series of gardens which they could plant and tend, so you could pop down to Gordon St. and pick yourself a few herbs or some salad to go with your sandwich and eat it in the space. It just might need some more thought and tweaking to make a workable solution, to avoid any possible vandalism, but we will keep working on the idea.