By Erik Illies

Again I am on my way northward to the city known as Chi-ca-go… it’s told that they have good pizza and good baseball, but I know better! What they do have good is some progressive policies in place for sustainable practices and incentives toward their urban development process. I was fairly suppressed to find that they have vertical farms written into their zoning ordinances along with a slew of requirements associated with them. Very good for me since now I don’t have to backwards/ sideways/ and from up underneath interpolate how this vegetative monstrosity of mine would be zoned!

Conveniently enough, as well, I found a site that is mostly abandoned former manufacturing buildings and is already zoned for future development. How lucky! It’s surrounded by dense residential neighborhoods, a school, commercial corridor, and has a Metra transit stop on-site. Too Cool!!! But enough about my awesome site and how well it falls into my intended design scheme… how about some architecture talk.

News of this first came from a colleague of mine, so I should give Jason Skidmore his due credit…. There, he has his credit. In Sweden there has been broken ground for their first Vertical farm. It’s called the “Plantagon” and is a 36 meter tall sphere with growing floors that spiral up and around inside of it. So far I’m extremely jealous if the name, and very intrigued in how their spiral floor will work.

Looks awesome though: http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=187818094655385&set=a.133173343453194.22122.131696156934246&type=1&theater