SUSTAINABILITY
Creating habitats

OMC°C attracted a lot of attention last year with ‘VERD°’: In Frankfurt am Main, on the grounds of the Senckenberg Museum, they presented a vertical greening system for urban locations that provides shade, binds particulate matter, stores CO2, supports biodiversity and also has acoustic benefits. The modular prototype was realised in collaboration with partners such as the designer Stefan Diez, Büro Just Architekten, the engineering firm Bollinger+Grohmann and the perennial plant expert Dieter Gaißmayer.

Since then, the Frankfurt Office for Micro Climate Cultivation has further developed the urban greening system and is now presenting ‘Vert’ in cooperation with AHEC and the Diez Office during the London Design Festival: a structure made of American red oak. The wooden structure will be presented in the courtyard of the Chelsea School of Art for a total of four weeks from the start of the festival on 14 September 2024. The wooden glulam structure will provide the base for the sails on which the climbing plants will climb during the summer. The performance of the fast-growing plant species is enormous: they can cool the surrounding airspace by up to eight degrees and provide four times more shade than a 20-year-old tree. The production of biomass is also more than that of a tree that has grown for decades – and can be converted into biochar in the autumn.

The living ecosystem can be easily integrated into the urban infrastructure and enhances it – both for the environment and for people. Depending on the needs, the system can be expanded and reorganised according to the environment. As the red oak is also more compact and stable than conventional construction timber, the amount of material used for the robust construction is minimal. Each element of the structure can even be replaced. ‘The project is intended to inspire urban planners, architects and designers to tackle climate change and, above all, to develop interdisciplinary solutions together. We want to show that large-scale greening systems can also be realised in densely built-up city centres. We want to offer the public a beautiful place during the London Design Festival: a cool and shady place, with flowering plants and buzzing insects, where you can be close to nature. A garden for insects and people in the centre of the city, a place to relax,’ says Nicola Stattmann, CEO & Founder, OMC°C.

London Design Festival
14. to 22 September 2024

"Vert"
Chelsea School of Art | 16 John Islip Street, London, SW1P 4JU