Sustainability
sustainability
Living Walls: How to Design, Plant, and Price Them – SFGate.com, May 4, 2013
A living wall makes a beautiful and dramatic focal point that pleases clients… highlights the abilities and professionalism of your company. Learn what you need to know about adding these popular interiorscape features to your company’s list of accomplishments.
Featuring Jim Mumford, GreenScaped Buildings, San Diego CA
Read more: http://events.sfgate.com/san_francisco_ca/events/show/314681063-living-walls-how-to-design-plant-price-them
Speak Kindly to the Plants
“Speak Kindly to the Plants… and the People!”
It’s so easy to get busy with work and home and family and all the million little sticky notes, lists and pieces of paper that are flying around. Those reminders to do something, buy something, call someone, or submit something by a deadline. Life is one BIG deadline.
The plant business has an added sense of urgency because we are working with a perishable item. Plants want to live, but they don’t like being ignored, left in a dark corner if they need sunlight or in hot sun when they want shade, not watered if they are thirsty, watered too much if they want to be dry.… Read More
Want A Garden On Your Wall? U-T San Diego, March 10, 2013
If you’re over the potted-plant look and have some tax money to spend on your home or business, one thing to consider is a wall garden or green roof.
This special niche in the landscaping world remains relatively unknown but has in recent years attracted big-time clients like celeb chef Mario Batali, SDG&E and Fashion Valley Mall in Mission Valley, a major regional mall in Southern California.
The firm that served those clients and many more is Good Earth Plants, which evolved from a downtown San Diego plant kiosk to a warehouse space in Kearny Mesa. It also birthed sister company Greenscaped Buildings.… Read More
My TEDx Experience
Speaking with students is a prospect filled with questions: Will they be interested? Will I sound relevant? Is my topic “cool” enough? Is the word “cool” still “cool?” As I get older I find I look at youth and wonder if they go through the things I went through. Or have computers and social media changed us all so dramatically that it’s impossible for us to relate to each other?
I was fortunate to be asked to speak at the TEDx Youth Conference last November and my 17 year old son Theodore attended the presentation. I had ten precious minutes to get everyone to think about plants and why they are important to us. … Read More
Urban Heat Island Effect Bigger Than We Thought
Remember when the terms “Global Warming” and “Climate Change” were first mentioned? Now it’s commonplace. I just read how a research meteorologist at Scripps Institution of Oceanography is suggesting that big cities in North America and Asia may generate enough heat to warm areas as far north as Canada and Siberia as much as 1.8 degrees.
In general, the heat gathered from the urban heat island effect rises and travels upwards and its energy may change high-altitude currents in the atmosphere that dictate prevailing weather. Meteorologists have known that cities are warmer than rural areas with cars, buildings, asphalt and roofs that absorb heat.… Read More
Rainwater Harvesting Tips
With the upcoming storm we though we would share some information with you on rainwater harvesting, courtesy of GreenScaped Buildings Project Manager Kevin Norton.
Rainwater is typically used to supplement potable water for landscape watering. By capturing large amounts of rainwater you can guarantee your potable water use during the driest months will be a minimum in comparison to your current water usage. Rainwater is best used for lawns, flowers and vegetable gardens. In drought stricken areas like Australia and San Diego, rainwater is used to supplement typical household water uses like laundry, then it is “re-purposed” as greywater to the landscape.… Read More
Green Wall Business
We’ve seen a major shift in inquiries for green roofs projects to opportunities for living walls. Thankfully we’ve been trialing and demonstrating living walls here at the office for the past four years. The lessons, tricks and idiosyncrasies we have learned are invaluable and have allowed us to not experiment at a client’s location. As such, I am not willing to install a new system that we have not sufficiently worked with to understand all of the possible challenges associated with that particular system. I’m of the opinion that nearly anyone can install a beautiful green wall, only a select few of us can keep it looking that way for years.… Read More
Selling Plantscaping to Upper Management
6 Keys to Getting the Green-light to Green-Up Your Office
As the Facilities or Operations Manager, your job is a delicate balance of keeping the company running smoothly and managing what seems like tighter and tighter budgets. Upper management expects you to ‘do more for less’ year after year and at some point, a priority needs to be made on the company workspace aesthetics and sustainability.
After all, a well-heeled reception area and conference room can project an image of a company that prospects want to do business with and employees want to work for. Interior and exterior plantscaping is not just the “living art” that beautifies a space, it can also create a work environment that improves air quality, reduces absenteeism and increases both productivity and employee morale.… Read More
4 Questions to Ask When Hiring a Plantscaper
What you don’t know can really cost you the green!
No matter where you stand on the great outsource-insource debate, it is abundantly clear that most businesses in San Diego, don’t want to add interior plant design and plant maintenance to their list of in-house services—much less add it to the job description of an employee who may turn your greenery into compost!
Some things are just better left to the professionals—especially those with a green thumb! But how do you know which professionals will give you the best green for your green?
Good Earth Plants services many clients in San Diego and southern California who have shared their stories of plants gone wild, or more accurately, splash and dash companies masquerading as plantscaping companies.… Read More
