LA Urban Farms Offers An Ingenious Solution to Gardening in the City

As skinny scrapers fill in the skyline and air rights become ever more enviable, one thing is clear for us city dwellers: We’re living in an increasingly vertical world. So perhaps it’s not a surprise that even the most fundamentally sprawling vocation—farming—has followed suit with hydroponic and aeroponic systems that allow growing without a traditional garden. And as these planting systems that thrive upward rather than outward add a bit of green to our rooftops and terraces, the innovative brand LA Urban Farms has made its mark on the landscape.

Based in Los Angeles, where water restrictions often make gardening (much less full-on farming) seem an impossible feat, the company offers a vertical aeroponic garden that has won the support of green-thumbed celebrities such as Jessica Alba and Reese Witherspoon, as well as the chefs from the ever-buzzy (and hyper-local) Google cafeteria. In the innovative system—devised for both commercial and residential use—minerals and nutrients mixed with water in the garden’s base are drawn up through the center of the column and then showered on the roots below in a continuous cycle. Not only does the planter have a smaller footprint than a vegetable garden, it consumes 90 percent less water and allows plants to grow more quickly. The commercial tower holds 44 plants and the residential size, 28, an easy way to try your hand at growing leafy greens, veggies, fruits, or flowers. No soil required.

For more information visit laurbanfarmom

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