Inspiration Case 11: Urban Green Walls

INSPIRATION CASE 11: URBAN GREEN WALLS General Information Urban Green Walls are living hence self-regenerating cladding systems using climbing plants or vertical garden technology attached to walls of urban buildings. Climbers are the easiest and an interesting solution: whilst they have been used on buildings for centuries; modern methods, for example by using high-tensile steel cables, have enabled the concept to be used far more adventurously. With modern technical solutions and suitable species selection, heights of much more than 25m can be attained if plants are being grown in irrigated containers.

Inspiration & Parametres for change a) temperature control & energy saving

Climbers can dramatically reduce building’s maximum temperatures and its daily temperature fluctuation by as much as 50% by shading walls from the sun. Evergreens even provide winter insulation by maintaining a pillow of air between the plant and the wall and reducing wind chill on wall’s surface. Interestingly, a reduction of wind chill by 75% can reduce heating demand by 25%.

b) public benefits & wildlife habitat

Next to CO2 absorption, green walls have been shown to be highly effective at trapping dust and concentrating certain dust-derived pollutants in their tissues. Further, they help to reduce noise levels, solar heating and the ‘heat island effect’. As green walls attract insects and birds, they also contribute to the local and regional biodiversity.

INSPIRATION CASE 11: URBAN GREEN WALLS Our inspiring examples: Musée du quai Branly, Paris, France

Urban Green Walls can be found all over the world. One very interesting example in modern architecture is Patrick Blanc’s Vertical Garden System on the Musée du quai Branly, Paris, that allows plants and modern buildings to live in harmony with one another.

What does this mean for the local community? As mentioned already, urban green walls bring a huge benefit do the local community by reducing solar heating of building walls in the summer, hence help to get rid of the ‘heat island effect’, and reducing wind chill in the winter to save heating costs. But much more, they contribute to local and regional biodiversity as they offer habitat to insects and spiders, which in turn attract insect-eating birds and bats. If there is a roof garden applied to the building, green walls will also act as a transit route for wildlife between habitat at ground level and those established on higher levels. The perception of contemporary architecture is often poor and seen as sterile. However, green walls bring visual benefits to the local community, for example by planting clematis, honeysuckle, wisteria, passion-flower, morning-glory or jasmine. These plants will provide the vertical garden with highly colourful flowers that can serve as nectar sources for insects, as well as providing a pleasant scent.

How does an Urban Green Wall work in detail? There are several ways existing to design urban green walls, be it indoor or outdoor. Patrick Blanc’s vertical garden approach that can be found in the Musée du quai Branly consists of a three-part system: a PVC layer, some felt and a metal frame in a soil-free self-supporting system to be hung on a wall. Other examples show a simple use of climbing plants. The most commonly used species for wall-greening are ivy (hedera sp.), Russian-vine (Fallopia sp.) and Virginia-creeper (Parthenocissus sp.), which climb directly onto wall faces, especially those of brick and stone, and form a dense evergreen foliage many metres in height quite quickly.

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