Ever since the High Line appeared above the streets of Chelsea in New York, cities across the globe have been working on creating their own variations of the civic project. In London, this iteration was to be the Thomas Heatherwick designed Garden Bridge. However, the project was marred by controversy due to suspicious funding and motives and was finally nixed by the Mayor back in April. Well, as the Guardian points out, London could've stood to take a few pointers from the South Korean capital of Seoul, whose MVRDV designed Skygarden opened over the weekend to much excitement.
The firm won the bidding process back in May 2015 and have since been working to transform an existing overpass in the heart of Seoul into a 983-meter long public garden, overlaying a matrix of Korean flora onto the 16m elevated steel and concrete structure. The Rotterdam-based architecture and urban design practice has gathered 50 families of plants, collecting around 228 species and sub-species and arranged them according to the Korean alphabet. The park will also be somewhat of an urban nursery — with plans to transplant or sell the plants once they've outgrown their concrete settings.
Check out more images of the project in the gallery below!
I like the idea, even more than the Highline, but it's half-baked.
The idea of making the city tree farm a public space is pretty cool, allowing the public to interact with plant material prior to permanent installation. In light of this, some respects the bare qualities of the project are more honest than the Highline. It's not a place of permanence for the plants, and read as such- in contrast to the highly "cartooned" ruderal plant palette of the Highline.
But... if it's really a tree farm, it should messier, and more moisture laden, a micro-climate unto itself. That control of the environment would have made this a landscape instead of a bare strip of concrete with some retro 60's planters.
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No warmth, no shade!
This is a poor imitation of the NYC Highline. Planters on a raised platform alone does not make these spaces usable, interesting or commanding. I think once you've seen this, you will be bored and never come back. Ultimately this makes it a failure.
yea i completely agree. it's a very strange imitation. perhaps their budget was just too low to do anything else, but even the choice of materials - all concrete basically - makes it feel like you are just part of the automotive highway
They'll have another shot at it when the trees die.
we have come full circle back to bad pomo futurism
I like the idea, even more than the Highline, but it's half-baked.
The idea of making the city tree farm a public space is pretty cool, allowing the public to interact with plant material prior to permanent installation. In light of this, some respects the bare qualities of the project are more honest than the Highline. It's not a place of permanence for the plants, and read as such- in contrast to the highly "cartooned" ruderal plant palette of the Highline.
But... if it's really a tree farm, it should messier, and more moisture laden, a micro-climate unto itself. That control of the environment would have made this a landscape instead of a bare strip of concrete with some retro 60's planters.
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