Productive Urban Landscapes

Research and practice around the CPUL design concept

The Community Kitchen on Queen's Road in Brighton (source: Brighton & Hove Food Partnership www 2019)

The Brighton & Hove Food Partnership is all about food

“For over twelve years we have been working with food to engage with people. We are at the forefront of a global movement, which aims to bring people back to the basic message that good food is a right for all, brings power and energy to everyone and is a joy to be shared.” Vic…

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Bohn&Viljoen's Cuba exhibit at Hands On Urbanism (source: Elke Krasny 2013)

INVITE: On Critical Care for a Broken Planet, Lecture by Elke Krasny on 26th June

Professor Elke Krasny will be coming to the University of Brighton on 26th June to give a lecture titled  On Critical Care for a Broken Planet –Architecture and Urbanism beyond the Capitalocene, an event sponsored by the Centre for Spatial, Environmental and Cultural Politics. In medical terms, critical care, also known as intensive care, is…

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Berries Feast and music come together in a neighbourhood event. (source: Spiel/Feld Marzahn www 2019)

INVITE: Berries Feast at Spiel/Feld Marzahn, Germany

It is already the 4th year that the community gardeners at Spiel/Feld Marzahn celebrate their traditional Beerenfest [Berries Feast] at the same time as the Berlin-wide Fête de la Musique. Gardeners, neighbours and friends are invited to an afternoon and evening of music (instruments and singing welcome!) at the Großes Beet [Big Bed] led by…

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Lecture to students at the TU Berlin, Germany

Katrin Bohn held a lecture for Master’s students at the Technical University of Berlin’s Institute of Landscape Achitecture and Environmental Planning (ILAUP) in Germany. The lecture was part of the Institute’s “Theory & Practice” lecture series for students of the University’s international Master’s in Urban Design and organised by its Department Landscape Architecture . Open…

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INVITE: Start of the gardening season at Spiel/Feld Marzahn

The first seeds are already in the ground in the “big bed” at the Spiel/Feld community garden in Berlin’s northernmost borough of Marzahn-Hellersdorf. And in two days happens the community association’s first Spring meeting. Please be invited to the gardeners’ meeting of Spiel/Feld Marzahn e.V. this Wednesday, 10th of April 2019, at 4pm. We want…

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Building-integrated agriculture, from the AESOP group’s website (source: AESOP SFPG www 2019)

INVITE: Call for papers for AESOP Sustainable Food Planning conference

The deadline for the call for papers for the 9th AESOP – Sustainable Food Planning Group conference, titled Agroecological transitions confronting climate breakdown: Food planning for the post-carbon city, has been extended to the 22nd of April. The conference will take place on the 7th and 8th of November 2019 and offer side events on…

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The Theater am Rand with its solar roof seen from the North (source: Theater am Rand www 2019)

INVITE: Seed exchange at Theater am Rand near Berlin

This Sunday, 24th March 2019, the already traditional Saatguttauschbörse [seed exchange] starts at 11am at the Theater am Rand at Zollbrücke 16, Oderaue near Berlin, under the slogan Sharing seeds, Exchanging experiences, Safeguarding diversity. As this is an event in German, here follows the German invitation: Saatgut teilen, Erfahrungen austauschen, Vielfalt erhalten Die Saatguttauschbörse zum…

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The Big Bed at Spiel/Feld Marzahn seen in 2011 (source: Katrin Bohn 2011)

Berlin’s Spiel/Feld Marzahn association elects a new head

Last week, the neighbourhood association Spiel/Feld Marzahn e.V. held its annual general meeting in which the past gardening year of 2018 was celebrated and the new year planned. All attention centred around the 600 m² food-productive garden and its associated people, facilities and activities. Apart from providing the opportunity to grow fruit and veg outside…

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Four aspects of the urban metabolism will be linked in COST Action Circular City: water, food, resource recovery and the built environment. (source: COST Action Circular City www 2019)

COST Action Circular City committee and working meeting in Vienna

Last week, Katrin Bohn took part in the 2nd management committee meeting and working group workshops of the COST Action Circular City. The event was held at BOKU University Vienna who’s Dr. Günter Langergraber chairs this network. From the 38 participating countries, 36 countries were present at the meeting which laid the platform and plans…

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Four different organic sprouting seeds – mustard, red clover, alfalfa, cress and – are tested for an installation. (source: Katrin Bohn 2008)

INVITE: Vitamins out of the jar in Berlin, Germany

Please do come along to a new event of the hands-on event series Preserving, Exchanging, Tasting organised and run by LebensMittelPunkt Spandau in cooperation with KlimaWerkstatt Spandau and Zentrum für Kulturforschung. This time, the group will look at sprouts and germlings and how they can help people to get through the winter with self-grown produce….

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Image: Green facade of a residential Gründerzeit building in Berlin (source: Reinhard Groszmann 2019)

A new food-productive life for Berlin’s fire break walls?

Yesterday, Katrin Bohn was invited by the Eastern branch of Germany’s B.A.U. Association [B.A.U.-Regionalgruppe Ost des Bund Architektur & Umwelt e.V.] to consult on its Initiative Green Fire Break Walls [Initiative Grüne Brandwände]. Aim of the working meeting of the association was to explore synergies between its own initiative to transform into “green walls” Berlin’s…

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A Mulberry Tree in the London Borough of Hampstead (source: Museum of Walking / Peter Coles www 2019)

INVITE: Midweek Midday Mulberries this Wednesday 16th of January

This Wednesday, 16th of January, the Museum of Walking is inviting to one of its famous London lunchtime walking tours. Please meet at 12.30 pm at Belsize Park Underground Station for about an hour of exploring the wealth of London’s food-productive urban landscape. This is what the Museum of Walking says: This lunchtime walk starts…

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CPUL research in China

Research on Urban Productive Landscape Practices, Wang, K., Wang, Z. and Wang, Z. (2014) Based on the urban landscape situation in China, the article puts forward bringing food planting back to people’s daily life. It focuses on productive urban landscapes (here translated as ‘urban productive landscape’), which reflects agricultural production, current urban lifestyles, environmental quality. After…

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The 'Big Bed' occupies an area of about 600 m² in a much larger brownfield site surrounded by high-rise appartment blocks. (source: Katrin Bohn 2017)

Christmas season at Spiel/Feld Marzahn

Last week, the now already legendary Christmas party of Berlin’s community garden Spiel/Feld Marzahn happened in nearby community centre Felix. It’s a small event, but for the gardeners, neighbourhood activists and friends and supporters it is the one time in the year where all sit together, enjoy tea and the seasonal food everybody brought in…

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One of many urban agriculture vending machines found in Nerima City, used by urban farmers for selling produce to local residents. They indicate how within Tokyo, culture and infrastructure are well positioned to accommodate an expansion of the local distribution networks required to enable extensive areas of productive landscape. (source: Bohn&Viljoen 2018)

Productive green zones in Tokyo, Japan

Last week, André Viljoen returned from his first working visit to Japan where he acts as a consultant to Nerima City on invitation by the City’s Mayor. André writes: ‘Tokyo was a revelation. During the 8-days of field work, most of my time was spent visiting an impressive and largely unknown, in the Anglo Saxon…

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卡特林·波尔: 设计可持续的生产性景观是一项复杂的任务 Designing productive urban landscapes is a complex task

When researching the academic impact in China about the productive urban landscape concept by Katrin and André, I was lucky to find this interview from 2010. Despite nine years having passed, their wisdom in the relevent field is still active, we still could recognise the influence in some of the theses published today in China….

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The first part of the Platform is dedicated to Berlin's community gardens. (source: Beatrice Walthall 2012)

A networking and information tool on productive urban green

Contracts have been signed between the Berlin Senate Department for the Environment, Transport and Climate Protection [Senatsverwaltung für Umwelt, Verkehr und Klimaschutz] and the AG Stadt & Ernährung [Working Group City & Food] to begin their joint work with Berlin’s community gardeners. Aim of the project Plattform Produktives Stadtgrün [Platform Productive Urban Green] is to…

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Analysis of the aerial photo of Amir-Abad Garden clarifies the quality of synthesis of the utilitarian agriculture with pleasure gardening. It creates two kinds of sceneries concerning their separation in plants, position, direction, planting design, and application. (source: Khalilnezhad, M.R. (2016) Urban agriculture as a tool for city and landscape planning in Iran with emphasis on the role of Persian Gardens, PhD thesis, Technische Universität Kaiserslautern, p 68)

PhD thesis based on Continuous Productive Urban Landscape (CPUL) in Iran

We are happy to share a dissertation written by Dr Mohammad Reza Khalilnezhad from Iran who, by his own words, is one of the first landscape architects in Iran to work scientifically on edible landscapes. His PhD, entitled Urban agriculture as a tool for city and landscape planning in Iran with emphasis on the role…

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The Action already includes representatives from 38 countries. (source: COST Action “Circular City” www 2019)

COST Action Circular City kicks off successfully in Brussels!

We are pleased to announce that the COST Action network was formally started on 22 October 2018 in Brussels with the first management committee meeting! Fully titled COST Action 17133 Implementing nature-based solutions for creating a resourceful city, our network was welcomed by Carmensita Maimban and Mickael Pero from COST Europe who gave an introduction…

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The increasing number of exhibitions about urban agriculture and CPUL hosted by arts and architecture institutions and galleries indicates how these subjects are entering the international architectural and urban design discourse. (source: Bohn&Viljoen 2009, as used in the article)

连贯式生产性城市景观 (CPUL): 关键基础设施的设计 Continuous Productive Urban Landscape (CPUL): Designing essential infrastructure

During my research, I came across this article written by Katrin and André published in 2010 by one of the best landscape magazines in China – Landscape Architecture China (LAC) (now renamed as LAF) -, which most Chinese architects, landscape designers and city planners subscribe to. The main idea of this paper has been a…

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