A Farm...In Your Window?

One of the most intriguing things I’ve found on the Internet lately has definitely been The WindowFarms Project.  The project was started by New York artists, Britta Riley and Rebecca Bray, through a residency at Eyebeam Art and Technology Center.  It was sponsored by Riley and Bray’s interactive design firm, Submersible Design.

The women originally set-out to find a way to grow their own food inside their apartments.  With limited space, but the desire to have more control over the foods they ate, The WindowFarms Project was conceived.

A window farm is a vertical hydroponic garden.  It consists of plastic water bottles, plastic tubing, an air pump, and simple hydroponic supplies.  Is in an integrated system which allows the grower to use the vertical space of their window(s) to grow their own food.

By using the space available, each window farmer is contributing to the reduction of the carbon dioxide emissions from shipping foods to the city.  They are also cutting back on what land is used by industrial agriculture to grow foods.  And most importantly, they have control over what their foods are exposed to while growing (chemical pesticides, herbicides, fertilizers, etc).

Within 6 months of launching the project, it had picked up international attention and inspired gardeners, teachers, “foodies”, and many others to build their own window farms and share their knowledge with each other.  Through what is referred to as “crowdsourced innovation”,  and a method called R&D-I-Y (research and develop it yourself), people were able to share their successes and failures, ideas for improvements, and results of different tested techniques with one another.

Through all of this interactive feedback and collaboration, the window farms have evolved, with the designs getting better and better.  Riley makes it a point to state that all of this collective knowledge is not necessarily aimed toward creating the perfect window farm, but to help anyone who is interested in finding a system that works for their specific needs.  The end goal is to empower people to be able to grow their own foods in whatever living space they have available.

I don’t know if a window farm would work for everybody, but regardless, in my opinion this is an amazing step towards the drive for humans to be less dependent on unknown food supplies and more self-sufficient.

Not only is it much better for our own health and our environment, it’s just smart and innovative thinking.  It’s projects like this, started on such a small scale, which will help revolutionize the way we grow and eat.  Kudos!  For more information on widow farming, visit: Window Farming: A Do-It-Yourself Veggie Venture.

Until next time, take care and happy gardening!