Eve Sibley, an artist-gardener, makes gardens go vertical, horizontal and even upside down.
What happens when an unconventional art student turns activist? She marries the two, and becomes a radical food gardener. Eve Sibley, an artist-gardener, now makes gardens go vertical, horizontal and even upside down.
Who is she?
“A 34-year-old American,” Eve Sibley is quick to say. She founded World Food Garden, project involving a team of “individuals empowering themselves and others to grow small food gardens worldwide.”
What’s her story?
She went to a fine arts school to learn painting. She learnt it well, but also got infused with a lot of activism, which started with her community work in Brooklyn. That then, brought her to food gardens. “I think it is very important. And it’s perfect for cities with space crunch. Plus it’s more beautiful to look at, and it can feed you,” she says. If those aren’t reasons enough, they help the environment as well.
Eve took gardens up the walls in San Francisco and Costa Rica, and that’s when Freeman Murray — the technologist behind Jaaga, the alternative art space in Bangalore — who helped her code the website for WorldFood Garden, invited her to the city.
Vertical? How on earth?
Well, it isn’t exactly on earth, it is on a wall going up.
Sibley had earlier made a ‘Wall of salad’ in San Francisco — a vertical garden full of lettuces on a giant chain-link fence in full sun. And when she came to Bangalore in June 2010, the plan was to have one food garden running. Tomatoes, peppers, spinach and gourds grew on the roof. Plants took over the front walls of Jaaga as Eve moved on to create a swivelling garden with plants growing on revolving panels. It is all green on one side and the metal panel on the other side has some flying birds etched on them.
“Vertical gardens can be soil-based, hydroponics (where nutrients are added to the water) and aquaponics (where the water is sourced from a tank with fish in it. The fish excreta give plants their nutrients),” Eve says. Irrigation is the tricky part. “All that a plant needs to grow is sunlight, water and nutrients.” She has tried them all, and in Bangalore, she has built a hydroponics vertical garden.
Vertical gardens are definitely more ornamental than usual gardens, so, for Eve, her art studies came in quite handy.
How can I get one?
Eve started out adopting DIY tips on making a vertical garden from the Internet. She honed her skills through sheer practice. For expert advice, you can log on to http://worldfoodgarden.org.
Where’s Eve’s garden in Bangalore?
Eve’s garden adorns the walls of Jaaga, Rhenius Street on Richmond Road. It’s been grabbing numerous curious eyeballs. And more are always welcome. For the curiouser, Eve has some tomatoes beating gravity, growing upside down out of a hanging garden on the roof as well.
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