seeding the city

At the fabulous UPROSE in Sunset Park!

At the Co-Op School in Clinton Hill/Bed Stuy…

We added some green to the play area on the roof of a Williamsburg pre-school…

For Immediate Release Contact: Eve Mosher

October 19, 2009            646-492-1314

eve@evemosher.com

Patches of green sprouting across New York City

October – December, 2009

It may feel like fall in most of the New York, but on rooftops throughout the city, as little patches of green are sprouting, it feels a little more like spring.

Seeding the City, another public intervention by the artist Eve Mosher, is a rooftop installation 4 square feet of green roof (sedum and grasses) and a bright yellow and green flags with the project logo. The project, two years in the making, will introduce city residents to urban environmental issues and the role that green roofs play in creating a more sustainable city.

Before Mosher installs each green roof, she asks that the recipient put her in touch with two or three neighbors who are interested in the project. This neighbor-to-neighbor referral system creates a community network and gets people talking about sustainability.

The installations are being mapped and documented on the project site, SeedingTheCity.org.

Seeding The City is sponsored, in part, by the Greater New York Development Fund of the New York Department of Cultural Affairs, administered by the Brooklyn Arts Council, Inc. (BAC).

Mosher is an artist that creates art that encourages participation in the urban environment, her 2007 work; HighWaterLine received international attention for raising public awareness about climate change through an arresting public act.

PDF Version

the first installations and flags are up!

bedford stuyvesant

bedford stuyvesant

crown heights

More coming!

Georgia's Place

So the first installations went out today!!

The first one went to the amazing people at Georgia’s Place in Crown Heights. I will upload photos asap. My amazing project manager, Amanda, picked up the modules at Covenant House and brought them out to Crown Heights. They looked great – they are quite small but I realized during an interview that I did that this project is all about POTENTIAL.

Forming community networks that have the POTENTIAL to rally together to take on issues in their neighborhood.

Planting small green roof modules that have the POTENTIAL to become larger.

Given people an entry into urban environmental issues and remediation so they have the POTENTIAL to educate others or educate themselves further and speak about issues.

Given that, the little modules have a lot of POTENTIAL! (Hence the name, Seeding the City, it is about planting little seeds of ideas for people to act on). Wonderfully enough, at the first site, we talked about planning a Spring Planting Day where the residents will plant lots more green roof modules to install on their rooftop. (Maybe they will even make a few to give to their friends and neighbors to carry on the tradition!)

Little modules, big roof

The second installation is at EcoArtSpace, where there will be modules on display for public viewing and information about the project. It is part of the “Down to Earth Show” – there is an opening on October 3rd, from 6-8pm (at 53 Mercer Street) and will be up through November.

Three more installations should happen over the weekend and early next week – I will keep you updated. The flags are also on their way! 

flowering!

As we rapidly approach the launch of Seeding the City (in September, more info on participating), we check in on the growth of the modules on the roof of Covenant House.

modules on roof

The grasses are having a hard time, but the sedum have already started to spread.

growing

And some local wildcards have taken root…

modules

I wonder what kind of wildlife have been taking advantage of the greenery?

wildcards

sedum extended

The plants are growing now!

I was lucky enough to spend part of the last week working with the fabulous staff and kids at Covenant House New York. We were on the roof of their building in midtown Manhattan on two gloroous afternoons mixing the growing medium and planting all of the grasses and sedum. It went beautifully!

We used a mixture of potting soil (3 bags), grorocks (10 bags), sand (4 bags) and pea gravel (10 bags) to plant 646 little plants in 100 trays. The kids mixed their own growing medium, picked out the plants they wanted to use and designed and planted their own modules. Some of them did four or more modules!

One of the participants expressed his gratitude and said that he had never done anyuthing like it before. I had to agree – neither have I! He also promptly signed up for as many watering times as he could fit in his schedule! (I would too if I were a resident – it’s going to be fun to watch them grow!)

My gratitude to those helping with the planting, Huong Ngo & Colin McMullen (who will oversee the growing throughout the summer), my assistant Meg Whiteford, the amazing Tricia Martin who stepped in at the last minute to provide consulting and who so carefully figured out the plant mix for me and then showed up to help with the planting. And my deepest gratitude to Athana Kontinos who contacted me from Covenant House with her interest in working together, the kids at covenant house who volunteered their time to work on the project and the other staff who came out to help, especially Bret who is working with Athana on a much larger scale project to green Covenant House.

It is thanks to fresh ideas, a willingness to experiment and the support of a great staff that good organizations become amazing organizations.

They even got to boast about it on the international website!

I am so excited to announce a new aspect of the project which will be launching in the next couple of weeks.

MEC's green roof by 416style on Flickr

Over the course of the summer, I will be working with Covenant House to put together and grow the green roof modules. In a couple of weeks we will build the modules and plant the plugs with the help of the kids in the long term program. Over the course of the summer the kids will be nurturing the plants through monitoring, watering and feeding. In the fall some of the kids may join us to install the modules.

Through this partnership I hope to inform the kids about urban environmental issues through and interesting process in which they take on the care and responsibility of the plants. We also hope to give them knowledge and experience that aids in their own continued growth and development. Through the partnership we hope to introduce the kids to alternative art forms and methods of building and empowering community. We are all looking forward to a great season of growing!

Your support of the project is needed to ensure its success.
Just $25 will cover the costs of building and caring for a green roof module over the course of the summer.
$50 covers the cost of building and growing as well as the installation with the flag & signage.
All donations are tax deductible.

Please donate today!

I am officially announcing a call for first round participants for the Seeding the City green roof module installation.

If you are a New York City resident and interested in hosting a 2′x4′ green roof module, here is how you can participate:

1. Contact me.
2. I will provide you with information on urban environmental issues and the benefits of green roofs and technical information about the installation.
3. I will set up a site visit to see your roof.
4. If you do not own your building, we can jointly speak to your landlord, or you can contact your landlord for approval. I highly recommend participation from renters or people who live in co-ops and condos.
5. If your roof is a selected site, you will find 2-3 other people in your neighborhood (preferably no more than about an 8-10 block radius), who are interested in the project.
6. You will pass the contact information for these other interested parties on to me.
7. I will schedule your installation! (They will begin in September).

Please note, Priority will be given to those in the following neighborhoods:

• Bed-Stuy/Clinton Hil/N. Crown Heights,
• Greenpoint/E. Williamsburg
• South Bronx
• Two Bridges/Lower East Side
• Gowanus

And voila! You have a fabulous green roof module installed on your roof!

*Thanks to Steve Lambert for the term “green pyramid scheme.”